14. March 2005

Night
Photography
By Tom Axelsen

Preface
A lot of cameras are only used half of the time it's actually possible to use them! Many photographers are only using the camera during the daytime and the camera is packed away when the sunset is over.
But, there's no reason for this. There's a lot of subjects to be shot in the evening or at night time - and some of the subjects even get's better when photographed at twilight.

In addition the night offers possibilities for creative work in ways that are difficult or even impossible to accomplish at daylight.

Equipment
What equipment to use at night? - Not more than you probably already have : A camera, a tripod and a cable release.

The most important feature that the camera needs is a B-, Bulb- or T-setting. All three are functions that allows for long exposures.
Most SLR cameras has the B-setting, although it has been left out on some of the new "consumer models" which makes the camera less suitable for night photography - if you are in doubt wether your camera supports long exposures or not, then check the manual.

Tripod
A tripod is a necessity - however, at shorter exposures (below 30sec.) fence poles or similar can be used.
The tripod must be as stable and solid as possible and the tripod head must be of the type "panorama-head" or "ball-head"
The panorama head is the easiest to adjust in darkness, since you can lock each axis separately and adjust one at a time. Avoid the cheap photo/video tripods that many shops unfortunately sells. Only a few of these are stable enough to effectively be used in the nature and the video tripod head often lacks the ability to adjust the horizontal axis which will result in tilting horizons - I'm speaking from sad experience here.

Cable release
The cable release is a small yet important part. The main purposes are to avoid shaking the camera when pressing the release button and keeping the release button down during the entire exposure.
The cable release comes in many variants, electronic as well as mechanical with or without a lock.
The most widely used is the mechanical type - here it's important to get the one with a lock, otherwise you have to keep the release down yourself during the entire exposure - and then even a two minutes exposure seems very long.
Again there can be troubles with the newer "beginner" or "consumer" cameras, since not all of the allows for a cable release to be attached, be it mechanical or electronically - again you must check with the manual to be sure.

Film
I'm using film for night photography and what film to use is probably one of the most discussed issues in connection with night photography.
However, I have one demand for the film: It has to be slide film.
I have this demand for two reasons: For the first you can avoid the machine at the photo lab which normally has difficulties handling the dark pictures. If you shoot negative film and get them enlarged at a lab, you will often find that they are overexposed - this is the result of the automatic exposure of the developer/enlarger machine which makes all photos 18% gray. A second reason for using slide film is that it's simply easier to see if you have exposed it correctly!
(Using digital for night photography is beyond the scope of this article).

When you deliver your slide film to the lab, remember to ask them to give you back the entire roll and NOT cut them into sections of five (or whatever). With the often very dark night photos, it's difficult for the lab not to accidentally cut into the separate frames of the film thereby cutting you pictures in half!

I use Fuji Velvia (50 ISO, the "original Velvia"), Kodak Elite Chrome 100 Extra Color (100 ISO) and E200 (200 ISO) and Fuji Provia 400F (400 ISO) - the latter can be pushed to 4500 ISO - I have, however, only pushed it to 1600 ISO, but with very good results.

I'm shifting between the four film, depending on what kind of photo I want to take and what effect I want on the picture I'm about to expose. The Velvia and the Extra Color are very fine grain films with very strong colors and are very useful for star tracks.
Unfortunately both films are very sensitive to city light which gives a green sky so they are best used at the country site.
E200, on the other hand, gives a more neutral looking sky, maybe a touch red. With the higher sensibility of this film it's necessary at long exposures (beyond 30 minutes) to stop down to f:5.6 or f:8 in order not to over expose the sky.
The Provia is, with it's high sensibility, ideal for short exposures of silhouettes against a star cluttered sky. When the film is pushed to 1600 ISO (or more) it gets a blue color cast. However, since we normally connects the sky with a blue color, it's not bothering in any way.

Personal equipment
Besides the photographic equipment you have to make sure that your own equipment is adequate. That is, you have to bring warm cloth and a flash light (preferable with red light). If it's a long evening/night then also bring something warm to drink and something to eat. Hot cocoa or juice is the best - avoid the or coffee, since the caffeine will make you loose body heat faster and you'll end up freezing.

How to shoot?
When you have gathered and set up the equipment how do you then begin shooting at night?
Well, of course you can just "jump" into it and shoot a couple of rolls the first night and then learn from them.
However, the pictures can be improved significantly by using the normal rules of composition and by finding an appropriate foreground.
Foregrounds are difficult, because you have to think in silhouettes. If you aim for the foreground to be correctly exposed you'll end up with an overexposed sky, which doesn't look nice. The exceptions for this is (and of course there is an exception), when shooting in the moonlight. Here you get pictures that looks like daylight, but with stars on the blue sky.

I normally find the foregrounds at daytime - primarily because I simply walk in an area and shoot normal day light pictures, but also because it's an almost impossible task to find an appropriate subject matter in the middle of the night if you don't know the area in advance.
There's is also the issue of safety - it's easier to find ditches etc. in the day light instead of falling into them at night.

Exposure
One of the questions you will inevitably ask yourself when you are standing out there with the night sky above is : What exposure time to use? How long should I expose?

The easiest approach is to start out during the twilight hour (the first hour after sun set) while it's still so light that the cameras light meter will give you a reading. This reading can be used for later calculation of how long the exposure time will be. As a rule of thumb, when living as high up north as Denmark, the light will decrease with about one stop for every 5 minutes. This rule of thumb will apply between the end of August until the middle of April. Since the rule isn't 100% correct it's a good idea to make a couple of extra exposures with ±½ stop.
When the exposure has reached about 7-8 minutes at f:2.8, you can start on the long exposures at f:4 or f:5.6.
If you like night pictures that looks a bit like day pictures you have to go out in the days around the full moon. At this time the moon lights up the earth like the sun, only the light is about 200.000 times weaker, which results in exposures of 4-5 minutes using 100 ISO and at f:2.8.

Subject matters
So, what is there actually to shoot out there in the dark?
Well, it's up to you and your creativity to find out. But on a clear evening/night you'll always find star tracks, north light if it's visible (and if you live up north), shooting stars, maybe comets, lightning, fireworks, buildings that are lit up - only your imagination sets the limit, but in any case, always remember to have a foreground - a good foreground will set your picture apart from others.
If it's clouded the time with available light is only very short, but you'll be able to shoot some nice pictures of lit up buildings and with details in the sky as well.

I whish you good luck!

Tom Axelsen

You will Tom Axelsens gallery with night photography here (in Danish).

Links
• Tom Axelsens gallery
• Naturfotografi.dk A small group of three photographers (including Tom) is showing their work. In Danish.
• Shooting the Leonid meteor storm A description of my own attempt at night photography - far from as successful as Toms, but read about my experiences anyway.