Photographing Christmas lights

[Bootneck2]

Looking for advice on photographing houses with Christmas lights. Using FZ20

[squirl033]

"P" mode works fine, though you may find you get better results using aperture mode, set for f5 or higher, and letting the camera select the shutter speed it needs. keep the ISO at or below 100, even if you have to set it manually. use atripod and aremote shutter release if you have one, self-timer if you don't. a star filter can provide some neat effects if you have one and an adapter to attach it to.

here's a shot i took last year using my then-very-new FZ20...

[JMK1964]

I was wondering the same thing so I went out last night with my tripod and shot this with my FZ30.

Aperture priority mode f3.2, ISO80, 1.3s, no flash, and my handy dandy remote shutter release. I used manual focus (the autofocus was a little off) and targeted the house numbers.

I am still learning and experimenting since I'm kinda new to all this stuff.

[thekman620]

I usually use manual control, and will bracket 3 shots. I find for shooting at night time it is quite often better to not believe the meter in manual and overexpose. I quite often find that when the camera meter says it's correct, it is in fact underexposed and the pictures seem a little too dark and lifeless. Set your aperture to the desired stop, and take 3 or 4 photos at different shutter speeds so you can get a feel how the camera's meter works for this kind of shooting. I shot this at f/6.5 @ 3.2 seconds. Hope that helps a little......thekman.

[squirl033]

nice effect, Thekman... white balance must be a bear to get right with all those colors of light, huh?

[David French]

Try incandescent.

[Bootneck2]

Thank you for your very quick replies. I guess my happy snapping of last year wasn't the answer.

I'll experiment on the basis of the replies, all of which follow a single pattern. It is a bit like taking pictures of the moon. Full auto and I had was a bright disc. Go to manual as indicated on this Forum and bracket around 1/250 at f5 and the results were thrilling.

What a Forum, what people!

[thekman620]

Good question about the white balance Squirl. No kidding about being tough. Don't really know where you should start in trying to get a proper wb setting in near dark. I used auto for this shot, but you're right in asking how do you measure wb for shooting at night with this type of lighting? David F said to try incandescent which I will try. I'm going back to my brothers to shoot his lights again this next week. He and his neighbours go nuts with their display, and after shooting them last year, I wasn't real happy with the results. White balance is a problem, so this year, I'm going to shoot in RAW with my dslr. I should be able to get a better wb setting in pp. I'm going to try different settings in jpeg too, just to see if I can find the proper wb. I've never tried to get a gray card setting in the dark or low light. Anybody else know how to get an accurate wb when shooting night scenes?.........thekman.




squirl033 wrote:

nice effect, Thekman... white balance must be a bear to get right with all those colors of light, huh?

[squirl033]

it seems to me that the longer the exposure, the redder the pictures get... i wonder if there's a way to compensate for that...?

[rduve]

What about Night Scenery Mode? Has worked pretty well for me for getting it just right. I have not taken Christmas light pictures, but my night shots are generally right on using that mode.