The trap of photographer's life

Long exposure night scene is a favorite theme of many photographers. Although you often have to run around with a tripod at night and wait a long time to get a satisfactory picture, it is a happy thing to get a satisfactory picture.

However, taking photos all night often fails because of ignoring these small links. ...

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? 1、? "Mirror Pre-lift" of SLR camera

Because of the structure of SLR camera, after pressing the shooting button, the reflector must be raised to let the light enter the camera. However, in the long exposure process, even slight jitter will affect the final imaging quality. The process of reflector rising will also cause the fuselage vibration, so the SLR camera will have the function of "reflector pre-rising".

Before shooting, set the camera to the pre-rising state of the reflector. For example, the Nikon d8 10 I used is in the turntable at the upper left of the fuselage, which corresponds to the word Mup. Just turn to this position.

After that, press the shutter once, at this time, the reflector rises ahead of time, and then press the shutter again, which is the official shooting.

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Mup corresponds to the pre-elevation angle of the reflector.

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2、? Turn off the anti-shake function of the camera.

With the development of photography technology, many cameras are equipped with anti-shake function of the body or lens. For example, the technology of camera brands such as Olympus is very advanced, which makes the limit of many hand-held shooting broken again and again.

The anti-shake function of the camera will conflict with the anti-shake algorithm of the camera during the long exposure, and the camera will constantly try to correct the exposure during the long exposure, which may eventually affect the imaging quality.

For example, Panasonic's lens anti-shake logo is Power OIS on the lens, just turn it off. The corresponding anti-shake of some brands of cameras should be found on the fuselage and turned off.

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3、? Shoot with low iso

As we all know, the lower the iso sensitivity, the less noise and the higher the image quality.

In addition, if the iso is set lower, you can also strive for a slower shutter speed to achieve a better "trailing" effect (of course, the slower the shutter speed, the better, depending on the specific situation).

For example, the iso of most high-end Quan Huafu SLR is usually set to 100. If the sensitivity of the micro-single starts from 200, it will be set at around 200, which is the setting in most cases.

(Starry photography needs to adjust the iso to a very high level, even as high as 3200, which is the demand of specific themes. )

In addition, the problem that novices often encounter about the iso setting is that the iso setting was set to a very high level the night before, but the camera was turned off and turned on the next day, and the iso did not return to the initial setting of 200, but remained unchanged, so we must develop the good habit of carefully checking the camera setting before each shooting.

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Set iso to a low value of 100.

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4、? Try to use a small aperture, but avoid the smallest aperture.

As we all know, when other variables remain unchanged, the smaller the aperture and the longer the exposure time, the more obvious the "tailing" effect is. However, many foreign evaluations show that when most lenses are set at the minimum aperture value, the image quality will drop significantly. For example, the minimum aperture of many lenses is 22, and experienced photographers will lower it by one or two steps, using values such as 18 and 16. Of course, this also depends on the specific situation. Photography is about finding the best balance between different variables.

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Try to avoid choosing the minimum aperture such as f22.

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5、? Be sure to shoot in raw format.

Many people record their lives with cameras, and they will use jpg directly, or import wifi into their mobile phones and use software such as vsco and Meitu as filters. This is a way of life, there is nothing wrong with it.

But if you want to study photography seriously and improve your level, you must study later. Especially landscape photography, the later work is relatively important, and its influence on the quality of photos should not be underestimated.

Raw format records all the original information of photos, which is also an inevitable requirement for post-adjustment.

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Comparison of later raw formats

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6、? Try to avoid choosing seats with many tourists.

Some time ago, I was filming the sunset of the Tokyo Tower in the bleachers of Roppongi, Tokyo, when I was filming a long film. I didn't expect many tourists to come soon. Because it was dark, many people kept taking pictures next to me with the flash of their mobile phones. As a result, many flashlights affected my normal exposure, so I had to choose a seat with fewer tourists again.

Similarly, when I first started playing tripod long exposure, I went to Orange Island in Changsha to shoot fireworks with great interest. Because I was a little white at that time, I didn't know anything. The recommendations I found on the Internet were hundreds of dollars to buy a domestic wireless launch shutter, so I took a domestic wireless remote control shutter on the Internet.

On the day of taking pictures, I found that many people also used this cheap wireless shutter, and my camera was manipulated by others. What makes me speechless is that the remote control broke down after several uses.

Later, I honestly spent more money to buy Nikon's original shutter, which has been used until today.

Of course, now many micro-orders can be released through mobile phone remote control and touch screen, which is really convenient.

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Cell phone flash seriously interferes with long exposure.

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7、? When time is tight, turn off long exposure to reduce noise.

As we all know, the noise of photos comes not only from high iso, but also from long exposure.

Many cameras are equipped with "long exposure light noise reduction" function, which can greatly reduce noise. This is a good thing in itself, but after choosing this function, every photo will be denoised for a long time. For example, if you take an ordinary "traffic" photo, if your exposure is 20 seconds, then it is likely that the process of light noise reduction will take more than 20 seconds, which adds up to one minute.

Friends who often shoot long-exposure night scenes know that if you want to shoot a suitable picture, you usually need to shoot it many times, such as considering the change of vehicle flow and lighting. Patience is not a problem, but many times, this topic will not leave us for a long time. For example, the dark blue scenery that many people like after sunset has only a few minutes to capture. In this case, we can choose to turn off the "long exposure light noise reduction", which can save half of the shooting time. After shooting, you can go home and choose some noise reduction software that can also be post-processed.

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When time is tight, turn off "long exposure noise reduction"

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8、? Choose the right tripod

Tripod is a necessary equipment for most long-time exposure subjects. Regarding the choice of tripod, three aspects are mainly considered: quality, price and weight.

Usually, shooting long-exposure night scenes does not require expensive professional-grade equipment like Gitzo. If you often take pictures for a long time, try to choose carbon fiber to reduce a lot of pain, and of course the price will be higher accordingly. In terms of brands, try to choose brands and models with high popularity and wide use groups, read more reviews, or ask friends around.

There is a famous saying in the photography circle: "I didn't know that the first two were bought for nothing until I bought the third tripod." The implication is not to be too cheap, buying inferior tripods will waste money, and expensive cameras and lenses will also face great risks.

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Well-known high-end tripod brand Gitzo official product map.

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Avoid these traps when shooting long-exposure night scenes. I believe you can also shoot many excellent works! ?

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Photographed in Guangzhou

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Article: Mi Jia, synchronous photographer

Weibo: Mijia, synchronous photographer.

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