Taking night time photos

**Gamedude** · 12-05-2005, 00:44

Hoping to try to take some night time photo's of fireworks and parades and was wondering if its best to use a flash or not?

Seen some lovely pictures on this forum so maybe some of you might know which is best.

Thanks.

**Snapper** · 12-05-2005, 01:06

Definitely not. No flash. Forget it. Gouge it out of the camera with a rusty screwdriver so that you're not even tempted.

There are a few tips for night photos dotted around. Try:
http://www.orlando-guide.info/forums/topic_17970.asp or
http://www.orlando-guide.info/forums/topic_19024.asp or
http://www.orlando-guide.info/forums/topic_15713.asp

The problem with flash is that a camera's flash, even an SLR with a built-in pentaprism flash, can only throw light about 10 feet in front of you. What happens is that your camera is looking (focused) at something, say a character in the parade. The camera figures that it's too dark and so it fires the flash to illuminate the subject. It works out how much flash to send by measuring the light coming back ... but ... because the flash isn't reaching the subject it gets confused. It sends out the maximum flash pulse it's capable of, which usually ends up washing out the heads in front of you, or the ground, or someone standing next to you. Eventually the camera gives up on the photo.

You get the same effect at concerts. Think of a band on stage. They have heaps of 3kw spots, floods, fresnels, varilights, etc. pointing at them. Some of those stage varilights are two or three feet long and run hot enough to cook steak. There is no way, no way at all, that a tiny camera flash that runs off a 9v lithium battery is going to make any dent on the amount of light already happening.

Definitely no flash!

**phaedra** · 12-05-2005, 02:44

Here's a few night pics I took in December at MVMCP, these were taken in almost total darkness about 50 feet from the stage using a Panasonic FZ1 2Mp using its full 12x optical zoom, hand held at around 1/4 to 1/15 of a second using stage lighting, the camera has electronic image stabilisation. No flash used (it wouldn't have reached the stage!)

**LiesaAnna** · 12-05-2005, 15:25

these are really nice photos Jeff, my camera is a cheapie digital 3.2 kodak easyshare, is it the same for that? no flash for night piccies?
Steve any views please?
thanks

**phaedra** · 12-05-2005, 16:29

Yes, if you can get away with it!, the big advantages of the Panasonic Lumix series cameras are the electronic stabilisation system and the excellent Leica lens, 12x optical zoom is the equiv. of a 420mm lens on a 35mm camera, ideally you never use a shutter speed less than the focal lentgth of the lens so for 420mm I should use 1/500th of a second but in darkness that's just not going to happen!, not enough light. The stabilisation system lets me get away with slower shutter speeds and prevents the camera shake which results in blurred pictures.

Best bet if you don't want to use flash is to use a tripod, mini-tripod or just sit or brace the camera on a stable surface, using the self timer also reduces camera shake as you're not holding the camera

Compared to my 5Mp Minolta 7Hi the 2Mp Panasonic blows it away every time, given that the Minolta was $1100 in 2002 the Panasonic was a bargain at $179

The only limit with the camera is making prints larger than 8" x 10" so I may well pick up one of the new 5Mp FZ5s when we're over in October

**Snapper** · 13-05-2005, 04:19

Deffo Liesa. If you are photographing a parade, a show, fireworks, Main Street, the dragon at Downtown Disney, whatever else, you will almost always get better photos without flash. If your camera has an ISO setting, you can also try whacking that up as high as it will go. It will help, trust me, but don't forget to set it back down again afterwards. It will usually be a number that doubles with each setting, so ISO 100, ISO 200, ISO 400, ISO 800. You may even get ISO 1200 or ISO 1600. The bigger the number the more sensitive the camera is to low light, so you'll get sharper photos. The downside is that they might have a bit of grain, some random flecks of light or colour that shouldn't be there. Sometimes the grain looks quite nice and natural, other times it's a bit of a pain.

The exception to this is if you are photographing somebody (family member, etc.) who is standing only a couple of feet away. In this case you will need some flash. If your camera has a setting called 'slow sync flash' or 'fill flash' or 'balanced fill flash' try switching that on. It should help keep some colour visible in the background without turning your subject as white as a ghost.

Jeff - if you're in the market for a new camera I can heartily recommend a Nikon D70. I've had one for about 6 months now and it is just awesome. I have no doubt that the equivalent Canon kit is on par as well. If it were me I would look no further.

**phaedra** · 13-05-2005, 14:55

Hi

Only thing I'd add is NOT to increase the ISO setting on a digital camera above 200, the amount of noise increases dramaticaly at 400 and with a timed exposure it makes VERY noisy pictures. I usually shoot at ISO80 or lower if I can get away with it.

I think I'll stick with the Panasonic Lumix

I've had Canon, Nikon, Fuji and just about every thing else to play with but the quality of the Leica glass is gobsmacking!, I would never have believed a 2Mp camera would produce such excellent images, unfortunately the attachment file size limit on the forum means I can't post an original pic here without compressing it

Check out the Panasonic section on Steve's Digicams forums, there are some really good examples of what the Panasonics are capable of.

http://www.stevesforums.com/forums/view_forum.php?id=23

Here's a sample shot from Willow using an Panasonic FZ20 with a Nikon 6T close-up lens attached,

**Snapper** · 13-05-2005, 15:22

I'd have to disagree there Jeff. I'd say whack up the ISO as high as you can get it. Even with an image stabilised camera/lens system, you're far better off if you can shoot at a higher shutter speed if you are handholding rather than relying on the IS to keep the image sharp. You're always going to be trading off noise and grain against sharpness, noise and grain aren't great but they won't ruin an image. Lack of sharpness or out of focus will. To a large exetent you can also post-process noise out of an image.