Night Photography

Sat, 5th March 2011
5pm-11pm
Marinetime Centre, Persint 5
Putrajaya

Last week, after OT I straight away drive to Putrajaya just to attend the Night Photography organized by Olympus Malaysia. Actually, the class is not only for Olympus users but open to All who actually had SLR camera but what can I see mostly were Olympus fans. Never mind.

We started the Class around 6pm. The class was conducted by Mr David Chua, who is the professional Photographer from Singapore. He is so Humble although his already like a sifoo. According to him, his not so good in Night Photography because he is more on Wedding and portraits. But, to me his explanation on Night Shot really-really helpful for a beginner like me... simple & understood. We started with theory first about 1 hour like that. Then, we divided into group for an outdoor Night Photography. And then break for Dinner. After that, around 7.45pm, we started setup our tripod and find the right angle to start the Nightshoot around Marinetime Centre. The view around here was really awesome for a Night Photography.

Not only there, we moved to another place also to learn more other techniques with different lighting condition but the area still around Putrajaya. The session ended around 11p.m.

Overall, I was really enjoyed the class although there's only two ladies. But, it is OK, I was lucky to meet not only a beginner like me but also the professionals who had also joined the class just for fun & to teach a beginner like me. Thanks everyone.

Group Photo (credit to David Chua)

Enjoyyy... few photos taken by me during Outdoor Night Photoshoot.

30 sec exposure

You need to point it the light to the camera to produce this

Use Small Apertures like F22 to create Star Bursts from lights...

This shot took 2 mins to achieve

Night in Putrajaya...
60sec Exposure (long exposure makes moving water blurry like clouds)

Tips on Overcoming Noise

• Use Lowest ISO available
• Activate in-camera noise filter and noise reduction (unless you intend to do it during post-production using Photoshop or other software)
• Instead of a single LONG exposure, you can also shoot multiple exposures of the
  same scene and stack them together in Photoshop. Example: 10 x 1min exposure = 1 x 10min exposure. During stacking in Photoshop, set BLENDING MODE to “LIGHTEN” for each layer you stack. You can stack as many as 100 layers or more.

Camera Settings Checklist for Nightshoot

• Picture Mode: Vivid
• Self Timer: 2sec OR 12sec
• Olympus in-body I.S. : Keeping it “ON”... advantage when your tripod is not that stable or when tripod is rested on unsteady ground or when you are using “BULB” without the remote release cable
• LV-info: Display Grid “ON” (if you have this function). It will help you get the horizon straight - ISO: set to Lowest ISO available
• Noise Reduction: “ON”
• Noise Filter: “STD”
• +/- EV: -1 to -2 in S/A mode when shooting in the dark
• Anti-shock in-camera: “ON”