Beautiful! How to shoot light painting photography?

"Graffiti" (light painting photography) is a simple but thoughtful skill. Besides drawing simple words and patterns, there are many different variations.

If you want to take such cool photos, please continue reading!

Light painting photography is to use light as a brush to draw the desired pattern and shoot it with a camera. I really feel greedy when I see all kinds of light-painted creative patterns taken by others. How to play light painting? Come and study.

Preparation before shooting

1. camera

The focus of light painting photography is to shoot the movement track of light source. So the first thing you need to prepare is a manual mode SLR camera. Ordinary digital cameras and micro-cameras generally have no manual mode, so it doesn't matter if you only have these cameras at hand. You can set the camera to night mode and turn off the flash.

2. Light source

The protagonist of light painting is of course the light source. If you want good results, you'd better use a flashlight. If you really can't find a flashlight, it's also convenient to use a mobile phone.

tripod

In order to get a clear light painting pattern, it is very important to fix the camera. Don't be discouraged without a tripod, just put the camera on a flat surface and keep it stable.

Step 4: Location

Light painting photography requires high environment. In order to ensure that the light painting pattern is not affected by external light sources, it is best to find a place with few street lamps at night. If the indoor space is relatively large, the darkroom is also an ideal shooting location.

How to take a light painting

1. Set the camera

Set the camera to M, that is, manual mode, reduce the shutter speed, set the aperture (F) to about 8, and adjust the sensitivity (ISO) to the lowest value 100. In order to facilitate shooting, it is best to adjust the focus mode to manual focus. As mentioned earlier, these settings are all for SLR cameras. If you don't have a SLR camera at hand, you can also try to use an ordinary digital camera. The longest exposure time of a digital camera is generally about 30 seconds, so the time left for painting with light will be shorter and more difficult.

Start shooting

Put the camera on a tripod or a stable plane and you can start shooting. Generally, it takes two people to cooperate in light painting. The photographer is responsible for pressing the shutter, and another person draws various patterns with a light source in front of the camera. If you are not skilled at first, you may not draw well. It is best to figure out what to draw and how to draw in advance and determine an activity area. Also, if you are not good at photo post-processing, you'd better write the words at the beginning upside down, so that normal words and patterns can be photographed.

3. How to shoot with a mobile phone

After reading the above, you may think that light painting photography requires more equipment, but it is not that serious. You can also shoot light paintings with your mobile phone. The camera of the mobile phone has no long exposure function, so you can only choose a place with very dark light and turn off the flash. The mobile phone can't be fixed, so we can only find a fixed light source, press the shutter and shake the mobile phone at the light source. Although you can't get the same clear effect as a camera, the fuzzy light and shadow also has a hazy beauty.

Special reminder

1. Using the reflection on the ground, the photos taken may be better.

2. Prepare some colored paper, wrap it on a flashlight, and you can draw patterns of different colors.

3. When shooting light painting, you need to find a dark place. Pay attention to safety when shooting!