State Fair of Texas night Photos

babybluetx23

Be gentle! hehehe I happen to LOVE this picture! hehehe This is the first time I have looked at a photo I did and thought "WOW! this looks looks like someone ELSES work!!!"
This is an attempt at night time Photography at the Texas State Fair. CC always welcome and appreciated!

DigitalMan

I like it Cynthia! : What was the shutter speed used?

babybluetx23

DigitalMan wrote:

I like it Cynthia! : What was the shutter speed used?

Here is all the Info:
Camera Model - Canon EOS DIGITAL REBEL
Exposure Time - 32/10s
F-Stop - f16.0
ISO Speed - 200
Focal Length - 39.0mm

RevLinePhoto

Decent photo. Take my suggestions with a grain of sand but would have used a little less aperture and a little faster shutter speed to try and single out the individual lights on every thing a little more because if you look at the archway and the word pizza it blends the light to gether. But as I said take it with a grain of sand and make your self happy with your work.

Ryan

babybluetx23

Papy wrote:

Decent photo. Take my suggestions with a grain of sand but would have used a little less aperture and a little faster shutter speed to try and single out the individual lights on every thing a little more because if you look at the archway and the word pizza it blends the light to gether. But as I said take it with a grain of sand and make your self happy with your work.

Ryan

hehehe Actually I appreciate every comment! I agree. I think the shot is a little over exposed, But in all honesty, for my First night shot.....I was SUPER Impressed with the shot!
Here is another one: I had to do a LITTLE bit of Post Prod. work on it, but not much.

Mike Lane

Gah! I went to the fair and got some shots. It was WAY harder to expose the shots properly than I thought it'd be. Anyone have any tips?

Higgmeister

Mike Lane wrote:

Gah! I went to the fair and got some shots. It was WAY harder to expose the shots properly than I thought it'd be. Anyone have any tips?

Hi Mike,
I find the best time to take night shots, as expounded by other DGrin members, is just before dark so you have some light in the sky. It not only adds color to the background, but it also gives a better (balanced) exposure. The other option is to bracket your exposures and stack the photos to get more dynamic range out of the scene. CS2 makes it easy.

Just my .02,
Chris

I have a few night shots in my Reno gallery that shows this.

Higgmeister

Hi Cynthia,
I like these. The lighting is always very challenging, but I think it's worth it because I like night shots (especially carnival). I do like your second one better than the first because of the lighting and subject matter. Looks like you had a good time with it. Did you use a tripod or hand held?

Thanks for sharing,
Chris

Mike Lane

Higgmeister wrote:

Hi Mike,
I find the best time to take night shots, as expounded by other DGrin members, is just before dark so you have some light in the sky. It not only adds color to the background, but it also gives a better (balanced) exposure. The other option is to bracket your exposures and stack the photos to get more dynamic range out of the scene. CS2 makes it easy.

Just my .02,
Chris

I have a few night shots in my Reno gallery that shows this.

No, no, no... I'm well versed in taking night shots... See below:







What I wasn't able to do was to expose everything properly at the fair (without resorting to photoshop trickery). The rides were either blown out (or large parts of them) or the rides were exposed well and the rest of the image was underexposed.

Should I just expect to have to resort to photoshop until my 32 bit per chanel Canon 20D is released or is there some trickery that I can do to make it work without photoshop?

EDIT: I should say that I know how to get good exposures at dawn/dusk/night. Whether my composition is good or the pictures themselves are worthwhile is a completely different subject

babybluetx23

I used a Bogan tripod for the night shots. I tried hand held, but of corse with a long exposure, it was too much of a challange to hold the camera still! I learned a VERY valuable Lesson taking night photos at the fair....Basically you set your camera to manual, step up your Fstop and you can lower the exposure time. Most of my photos were between 14 and 22 fstop and exposure time varied between .5 seconds and 3.5 seconds.
This is the first time I have EVER learned to use my camera properly insted of just setting it on a program and praying! hehehe My co-worker is a photographer for a local radio station afternoon show. Him and I headed out to the State Fair for the Express purpose of learning how to do night time photography. I think it is the BEST lesson in how to use your camera properly! hehehe

Mike Lane

So anyhow, here's my state fair picture. It's a combo of 2 pics actually. One exposed for the sky / most everything else, and one exposed for the ferris wheel.

babybluetx23

Mike Lane wrote:

So anyhow, here's my state fair picture. It's a combo of 2 pics actually. One exposed for the sky / most everything else, and one exposed for the ferris wheel.

Wow That is COOL! I like yours as well! I like to see the sky MUCH darker for some reason. I dont know what it is about the sjy being compleatly black.....It gives more focus to the subject, and less to the background. Other then that the Exposure is PERFECT!
My First Pic was two exposures, since the Ferris Wheel was SO far away from the Midway, The second picture was one exposure since I was MUCH closer to the ferris wheel.

babybluetx23

I have a few more on my zoto website if anyone is interested - http://babybluetx23.zoto.com

Mike Lane

babybluetx23 wrote:

Wow That is COOL! I like yours as well! I like to see the sky MUCH darker for some reason. I dont know what it is about the sjy being compleatly black.....It gives more focus to the subject, and less to the background. Other then that the Exposure is PERFECT!
My First Pic was two exposures, since the Ferris Wheel was SO far away from the Midway, The second picture was one exposure since I was MUCH closer to the ferris wheel.

Thanks:) I like the colors in the sky a lot on this one. Actually I tend to like some color in the sky as you can see from the other shots that I posted.

Higgmeister

Hi Mike,
Yes, you know how to get the night shots. You also do well at the fair shots as well if this shot is any indication. The best fair/ride shots I've seen have been when the photos are stacked (I don't have any:cry). That means PS trickery, but I think it is well worth it. You could always throw in a little fill flash; I think it would change the dynamics of the shot though.

Thanks for the clarification,
Chris

Mike Lane

Higgmeister wrote:

Hi Mike,
Yes, you know how to get the night shots. You also do well at the fair shots as well if this shot is any indication. The best fair/ride shots I've seen have been when the photos are stacked (I don't have any:cry). That means PS trickery, but I think it is well worth it. You could always throw in a little fill flash; I think it would change the dynamics of the shot though.

Thanks for the clarification,
Chris

Darn, I wish I would have gone into the fair knowing that I would need 2 shots for PS...

Oh well, at least I did one that way:)

babybluetx23

Mike Lane wrote:

Darn, I wish I would have gone into the fair knowing that I would need 2 shots for PS...

Oh well, at least I did one that way:)

hehehe Yeah I took One where the ferris wheel was exposed perfect and the midway was WAY over exposed. Then I took another one where the ferris wheel was WAY too underexposed, but the midway was PERFECT!
Let me explain a little bit about the layout of where I was......The Midway was only 50 - 100 feet in front of me but the ferris wheel was about a half mile away. therefore I could not have both of them in one shot perfectly exposed.
So I took both pictures. Then when I got home, I went into Photoshop and used layers to combine the good ferris wheel with the good midway.