Light Painting Help with Ghosting Subject?

[marco_dias1]

<p>uHi All experimenting with light painting, all if good apart from when i want someone to apear sharp in the picture i will use flash for them and they end up showing up as ghosts. so to break it down, camera on tripod i use a flash light with the camera on a 15 20 sec exposure, everything goes well at the end i have tried standing in front of the camera and flash myself so i would show up in the frame, but when looking at the pictures i end up showing up as a ghost. any ideas?</p>

[gulfbeach47]

<p>Try a little more exposure time, but of course you will need to remain still and this will affect other objects in the photo. Sitting or using something to brace you from moving will help. Also shooting with full moon light can help cut down on exposure time. Have you tried wider aperture? Bump up the ISO, but on some cameras higher ISO and longer exposure will create more noise.</p>

[Charles_Webster]

<p>You need to not light paint the portion of the frame you will appear in. The full exposure of you doesn't not block the light painting exposure in the same area, they are additive, so you appear transparent.<br>

Try to not light paint the portion of the frame where you/the figure will appear, or make a gobo from black paper and put it in the light path, close enough to the camera where it won't be in focus, to hold back that part of the frame for the subsequent flash exposure.<br>

<Chas><br /><br /></p>

[jcuknz]

<p>I would suggest that it is a question of balance between the flash and ambient/painted light if they are reasonably equal you will get a ghost while if the flash is stronger you will see the subject as whole.<br>

Really trying to do things in the camera is old fashioned film technique and far better and easier is to do it with layers in editing after getting the subject against a black background in a regular exposure. Anything in an upper layer with normal exposure blocks out the lower layers.</p>