Night photography

Photography is playing with light. The play evolves to a next level if there is very little light, that is to say: when it is dark. But as long as it is not completely dark, you can get light onto your camera's sensor. Just give it time!

One of the interesting effects of exposing for a long time, is that streetlights and the like turn into stars--no trick filter needed! Other effects include that moving elements such as clouds and water, turn into milky flows.

And finally, it is much more of a suprise what will come out of the camera, once you see it on your computer screen: how much have clouds moved? Which light reflections appear where? The effects of moving clouds and water are present but not very strong in my picture that goes with this post. The streetlights are conspicuous stars, though.

The picture is of 'Spectacles Bridge', the oldest stone bridge in Japan, in Nagasaki.

End of summertime

Now that in Europe the clocks have been turned back to 'normal' time, this photo is quite fitting: it was made during the summer time but is about nights--and we sure will have long nights again between now and March 2010.

Photographer's dilemma with this photo: what is the 'right' colour temperature? Lamp light is not as white as daylight. Lamplight is about 2800 K, daylight 5500 K on a sunny day. If you keep the white balance of your camera to daylight, the lamplight and all else will be awfully yellow. If you take the lamplight as 'white' as any RAW-converter will let you do, much of the nighttime atmosphere disappears. My solution: Just try some settings in between the two extremes until you get a satisfactory impression. The disadvantage of tampering with white balance is that you cannot really say that your photo has 'real' colours. Then again: your eyes and brain make adaptations to interpret different light settings, so why cannot you do the same in your post-processing of photos? That needs a well-calibrated screen on your computer, of course, but that is a different story.

Photo taken in Piran (Slovenia, Sept. '09).

Happy New Year!

Enjoy the fireworks in the neighbourhood (as I did)! I let the shutter open long enough (30 seconds) to see the neighbours make a day out of night--a little bit different from the standard fireworks pics.

Almelo by night

Yesterday evening, three of the Fotoclub went to look for some architectural pictures agains the light sky in neighbouring town Almelo. We ended up, after looking at some other places witout feeling inspired, at one of the obvious spots: the headquarters of the 'Waterschap' (water district board). I was not very successful in finding something new to show. How much can you do with a building? The reflection of lamps and the sky just after sunset on the blueish building and in the water were good enough for one picture. The other one is a detail of the building: somehow I find stairways intriguing, and this spiral one looked just right with the added frame of the window. Should I have photoshopped the bluish reflection of the sky in the glass away?