|
Hi Guys just thought I would put my 2 bobs worth in here,
I have been a Pro Photographer for the last 27 years and will check this forum often and hope to answer as many questions or help to fix as many problems as I can.
I might start by explaining what the main camera controls are, for those that already know please bear with me.
All photos are a combination of the three controls ISO, Aperture and Shutter speed to get the CORRECT EXPOSURE.
ISO stands for international standards organisation and it indicates the (speed)/sensitivity of the (film-- sorry old terminology) digital sensor CCD and each time you double the number the camera can take the same photo in half as much light problem here is if you start going over about 400 iso you start to introduce electronic noise to the sensor its sort of like static on a radio also the higher the iso the more grainy the pictures look. (just like it used to in the good old days of Film)
Apperture is the size diameter of the hole in the lens that lets the light through onto the sensor. Here the smaller the number the bigger the hole.
Apperture is used to control the depth of field(how much of the photo is in focus)
The smaller the number the smaller the depth of field(focus) . Its how you get the soft out of focus fussy backgrounds but the subject is sharp. Using a larger number eg f22 is how you get everything in the photo from foreground to background sharp. the depth of field is 1/3rd in front of the point of focus and 2/3rds behind the point of focus
Shutter speed is the amount of time that the shutter is open during the exposure and you use this control to stop movement of the subject eg if the car is moving you need to use the faster shutter speeds to get a sharp car or it will look blurey.
if you are using a shutter speed slower than 1/60th of a second you really should use a tripod night or day this stops the camera from moving. also if you are using telephoto lenses you really cant hold it steady enough at a shutterspeed less than the focal length of the lens. eg 300mm lens 1/300th of a second shutter speed
So my tip for night time photography would be this USE A TRIPOD, set the ISO to highest setting before your camera starts to introduce the grainey noise effect about ISO 400, decide how much of the photo you want to be sharp and set the appropriate apperture f number (small number=small area of focus, large number=large area of focus)
NOW because you are using a tripod the camera isnt going to move and neither is the parked car so you can use a shutter speed that is as long as you need to get the correct exposure could be a couple of seconds, can even be a couple of minutes if that is what is needed....
Marc the problem with the dark car against the light background is the light sensor is being tricked and averaging out the total amount of light in the photo
try zooming in to the photo so the car fills the view through the eyepiece or on the LCD press the shutter down halfway and keep it half pressed(this is when it takes the light reading) then zoom out to get the picture you want then press shuutter the rest of the way to take the photo.
Look the best thing we have now is DIGITAL unlimited amount of pictures so experiment it costs you nothing but time. When I was learning we had to pay for every single photo good or bad sharp or blurry under or overexposed and we had to wait to see results.
Sorry for the long post but I hope it helps.
FLY
|