Atlanta in the dark

patch29 · January 25, 2004

I wanted to test out how the digital camera would handle car light streaking. Here is a quick shot. Now all I need to do is to shoot it at dusk on a clear evening and it should look great.

patch29 · January 25, 2004

Compressing it for the web really broke up the sky. It is much smoother in the original file.

patch29 · January 25, 2004

Just for kicks here is a crop of the image at 100%, not too bad for a long exposure with poor lighting on a bouncing bridge.

wxwax · January 25, 2004

Patrick, that looks excellent. I really like the framing and the exposure.

Here are mine, probably too bright for you, because my monitor is a little dark.

wxwax · January 25, 2004

Well, mine looks pretty awful. I'll have to play with it. In the meantime, here's another version.

ian408 · January 25, 2004

wxwax wrote:

Patrick, that looks excellent. I really like the framing and the exposure.

Here are mine, probably too bright for you, because my monitor is a little dark.

Notice the lane change? From #5 to #4 to #3? Pretty
cool!

Oh, and the date setting on your camera is wrong.

Ian

wxwax · January 28, 2004

OK, so I saw how Patch framed his shot. And he told me dusk was a better time to shoot this kind of scene. So being the thieving little b*****d that I am, I went back down this evening and tried again. But it was so freakin' cold (by my standards anyway) that my fingers froze before the best light of the day. Enter Photoshop. I can see my ham handedness. You?

wxwax · January 28, 2004

Just want to make it clear that I'm stealing Patch's original idea for framing this shot.

HarveyMushman · January 28, 2004

wxwax wrote:

And [patch] told me dusk was a better time to shoot this kind of scene.

Why dusk? Reduces glare from the lights?

wxwax · January 28, 2004

Softer light, avoids the harsh shadows of unfiltered sunlight, really cool background light (can be dark blue or orange or red or purple,) still reveals details of the buildings, puts a nice tint on everything that's hit by the light, is a nice contrast to the brighter lights of the cars.

BTW, I now see I should have left more headroom above the tallest building. Ah well, live and learn.

HarveyMushman · January 28, 2004

Softer light, avoids the harsh shadows of unfiltered sunlight, really cool background light (can be dark blue or orange or red or purple,) still reveals details of the buildings, puts a nice tint on everything that's hit by the light, is a nice contrast to the brighter lights of the cars.

Is that all?

wxwax · January 28, 2004

HarveyMushman wrote:

Is that all?

As the man said, it's like bacon - goes with anything.

zero-zero · January 29, 2004

wxwax wrote:

BTW, I now see I should have left more headroom above the tallest building. Ah well, live and learn.

Waxy, I like your light best - dusk works so much better. But, at least Patch left out the ugly street lamp on the right edge...

(Never mind me. Just getting even for the "ugly hand" comment )

cletus · January 29, 2004

zero-zero wrote:

Waxy, I like your light best - dusk works so much better. But, at least Patch left out the ugly street lamp on the right edge...

(Never mind me. Just getting even for the "ugly hand" comment )

Waxy,

I won't be as harsh as Ø-Ø but... If you shoot that again I would try to loose the streetlight. I'm sure you already knew that though!

Here's another thought. I find the lighted sign just right of center to be distracting because it is so blown out. Since your shooting off a tripod (if you hand-held that shot, get to the hospital quick - if you're that steady, you're dead) maybe try one exposure much, much shorter to get the sign properly exposed. Then shoot you're main exposure and go back and use photoshop to combine the two images.

-Eric

DoctorIt · January 29, 2004

wxwax wrote:

....But it was so freakin' cold (by my standards anyway) that my fingers froze before the best light of the day.

Aw, poor waxy. What was it, maybe 30 degrees? This was our lovely thermometer reading the other day:

and thats partially in the sun.

I really dig the shot though!
and way to document the thievery

wxwax · January 29, 2004

cletus wrote:

Waxy,

I won't be as harsh as Ø-Ø but... If you shoot that again I would try to loose the streetlight. I'm sure you already knew that though!

Here's another thought. I find the lighted sign just right of center to be distracting because it is so blown out. Since your shooting off a tripod (if you hand-held that shot, get to the hospital quick - if you're that steady, you're dead) maybe try one exposure much, much shorter to get the sign properly exposed. Then shoot you're main exposure and go back and use photoshop to combine the two images.

-Eric

Good idea, Cletus, I was wondering if that light was an issue. I should redo the shot. And I noticed that lamp to the right but too late to change. :cry

Yeah, I'm a woos in the cold.

fish · January 29, 2004

wxwax wrote:

And I noticed that lamp to the right but too late to change.

Here's an excellent opportunity for you to get intimately familiar with your tool (clone tool, that is). Cloning out the lamp will over the sky will be pretty easy, but the building will be a challenge (or it would be for me). Try it and report back.

wxwax · February 11, 2004

Another night shot in Atlanta. Only 41 degrees this time, I got a sunburn it was so hot. After shooting this place for a couple of hours I went inside and had a couple of eggs sunyy side up, side of bacon and toast, and a nice warm cup or three of decaf with cream and sugar. Yum.

Because my monitor is dark, this probably looks slightly bright to everyone else.

wxwax · February 12, 2004

It was shot after dark, but indoors. And not at that diner, either.

DoctorIt · February 12, 2004

wxwax wrote:

It was shot after dark, but indoors. And not at that diner, either.

Eat me! EAT ME!

nice shot - color, detail is cool.

lynnma · February 12, 2004

wxwax wrote:

Patrick, that looks excellent. I really like the framing and the exposure.

Here are mine, probably too bright for you, because my monitor is a little dark.

Sid, I really like what you did... it must have been difficult too, your monitor being so dark and all....

wxwax · February 12, 2004

Thanks Lynn, you're very kind. One of these days I'll take a course.

gus · February 13, 2004

My 1st time exposure. We have 2 paddlewheelers that go past a few times a night.

gus · February 13, 2004

Funny thing is that i could never get the camera to focus at night...always used prog thus f1.8. But here the background lights have turned out a lot better on f8. Is this how its ment to be ? ie smaller aperture to get clearer lights at night ?

wxwax · February 13, 2004

No expert, but... the smaller lens opening at f8 gives a greater depth of field... so more stuff will be in focus. And the opposite is true for f1.8... shallow depth of field, ideally only the thing you focus on, is actually in focus.

pathfinder · February 13, 2004

wxwax wrote:

No expert, but... the smaller lens opening at f8 gives a greater depth of field... so more stuff will be in focus. And the opposite is true for f1.8... shallow depth of field, ideally only the thing you focus on, is actually in focus.

Smaller aperatures will also help prevent flare from point sources of light - eg artificial lights from vehicles, boats etc.

Also lenses - especially less than perfect lenses ( which includes most of the lenses most of us will ever own ) - are at their sharpest about 2 or 3 f-stops closed from their maximum aperature. And since you are making a time exposure - smaller aperatures are no problem unless you are doing a really long exposure - minutes say - and you get into sensor noise issues.

gus · February 13, 2004

pathfinder wrote:

Smaller aperatures will also help prevent flare from point sources of light - eg artificial lights from vehicles, boats etc.

Also lenses - especially less than perfect lenses ( which includes most of the lenses most of us will ever own ) - are at their sharpest about 2 or 3 f-stops closed from their maximum aperature. And since you are making a time exposure - smaller aperatures are no problem unless you are doing a really long exposure - minutes say - and you get into sensor noise issues.

Thanks guys...im getting there.

heres one of my pinhole shots.... about f400 & 4 mins exposure. Aperture is 0.3mm (0.011811 of an inch) Odd thing is that i understand this but cant get my digital right.

wxwax · February 13, 2004

I remember your pinhole work. I thought, and still think, it's great. And I really like that shot.

wxwax · February 15, 2004

OK, trying something new for me. I'm aware that the colors and the brightness levels may look off to the few of you who have good monitors. Knowing that, this is a rough pass. I was trying to make a mood.

gus · February 15, 2004

Waxola ...does your camera have histogram ? Ive been on it all day & the mist is lifting for me anyway.

I see a good shot BTW

wxwax · February 15, 2004

Yeah, it does. I've just started trying to figure out how to use it. I'm thinking that when I'm shooting at night, at least, I'll push the bump in the histogram both to the right and to the left in different shots. That way I have a choice when I get home, and can play in Photoshop. I'm tired of coming back with underexposed shots because I trusted the camera's little monitor, which shows everything to be brighter than it really is.

Atlanta in the dark

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