SAD154 :: Unknown camera/lens, but probably a Pentax :: Fomapan 400 :: 2008
Outside Tuscola High School, where I would sit in my car and dread the start of class.
03 June 2009
SAD154
SAD154 :: Unknown camera/lens, but probably a Pentax :: Fomapan 400 :: 2008
Outside Tuscola High School, where I would sit in my car and dread the start of class.
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3 comments:
So here's my question, you take a lot of pictures at night. How are you getting the images to show up? Also do I need to get a special flash for my camera if I get a 75-300 mm lens? Or should I just plan to only use that bad boy outside in good light?
Thanks :)
I actually have a lot of questions for you. I was going to originally send an email but I may as well ask them here since it seems other would benefit from the answers.
What is the black and white border around all of your negatives? I see it on a couple other peoples photos was wondering what the purpose was. Storage related? Ive also noticed your photos are very sharp. What fstop do you normally shoot at during night? 16? 22? Finally, how do you meter your photos at night? Do you use a spot meter or an incidence meter?
Thanks. I love your work and you have inspired me to go out to some back roads in a couple days with Hp5 pushed to 1600 and take some night shots.
Margy: The images show up because I give them proper exposure. This typically means shutter speeds of 5 to 10 seconds. Sometimes up to a minute. An off-camera flash is a good idea for any lens, especially for a long one that will probably cause a shadow with the on-camera flash.
Why do you want such a long lens?
Anonymous: Thanks for your comments. The black and white border is an artifact of the negative scanner. I am too lazy to crop it out.
I typically use two apertures for night shooting; f2.8 and f8. In addition to depth of field, aperture controls the rendering of light sources. I use 2.8 when I want light sources to appear as orbs, and f8 for everything else. Never needed to use f16 or f22 except in rare cases.
I don't meter night photos. I bracket like crazy. Film is cheap, and anything worth shooting once is worth shooting five frames of. Plus, even with modern spot meters and the zone system, you're going to run into reciprocity failure, and that varies with films and developer.
To answer your question, you could spot meter for the darkest black in which you want to retain detail, and then underexpose that reading by two stops.
If you are taking night shots, pushing to 1600 isn't going to help much. The two-stop difference between 15 seconds and a minute is immaterial in terms of hand-held camera shake. A tripod is a must, and if you're already on the tripod, you might as well use the film as its optimum speed.
Good luck.
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