How to shoot night scenes in low light environment

When shooting in low light, the most important thing to pay attention to is exposure, focusing and the configuration of light and dark parts. The following are the night shooting techniques and interesting night shooting locations that we often ignore, so that you are no longer afraid of the coming of the night.

Exposure rules of night photography

Exposure is particularly important for night scene shooting, which is also one of the factors that are difficult to control in night scene shooting. The light ratio of night scene is relatively strong, and if you use the average metering of the camera, it may lead to overexposure. This is because the overall brightness of night photos is often insufficient, and the metering system overexposed the picture in order to restore 18%. In order to ensure that the photos can reflect the atmosphere of the night scene at that time, the following methods are suggested:

Egyptian pyramids in the world park (F8, 8s, ISO 100, focal length 50mm)

1. Spot check an area with medium gray brightness. Because the light-dark ratio of the night scene is not fixed, it is not reliable to use average metering.

2. If you use average metering, you can observe the shooting effect through the playback function. If it is not ideal, it can be adjusted by increasing or decreasing exposure compensation.

3. If you are not sure about the exposure, you can try to surround the exposure. In this way, you can get several photos of the same night scene with different exposures, and then choose a photo with correct exposure.

Auto focus and manual focus.

Shoot the float parade (F4,1125s, ISO800, focal length 17mm).

Because it is difficult for ordinary digital cameras to accurately focus on scenes with low contrast and low brightness, and night scenes are often low contrast and low brightness, when shooting at night, we should focus on bright scenes first, and then lock the focus to compose, which can improve the success rate of shooting. Sometimes, the camera's autofocus function will not be able to cope with the night scene theme. At this time, the manual focusing function can be enabled to make up for the lack of automatic focusing function.

Brightness control of pixels

Foreground photo of the Forbidden City turret (F4, 1/20s, ISO800, focal length 18mm)

One of the characteristics of the night scene is that the contrast between light and shade in the picture is very obvious. If you can skillfully control the contrast between light and dark, you can form a unique picture. For example, the turret of the Forbidden City attracts more attention at night than during the day, because the sky is dark and quiet at night. Under the illumination of the light, the majestic outline of the turret is exaggerated, and the details at all levels form colors, making the turret very charming. In order to further improve the depth and expressive force of the picture, we can choose a suitable foreground to set off the main body of the picture, highlight the brilliance of the turret with the dark tone of the foreground, and form a bright-dark contrast of the picture elements, which is very infectious.

Choose the best shooting time

Is the night scene limited to shooting after dark? In fact, the sunset is very beautiful. Because the sky is not completely dark at this time, and the light is on, the final picture of the photo taken at this time has beautiful sky color light, and the ambient light will make the dark part of the photo have more details. Precautions for shooting are as follows:

Night photos taken at sunset (f 1 1, 1/2s, ISO 100, focal length 35mm).

1. Use wide angle as much as possible. Most digital cameras have the deepest depth of field at the wide-angle end, and the lowest shutter speed they can tolerate when holding is also higher than that of medium focus or telephoto, but of course, it is best to choose a camera with optical shockproof or CCD shockproof function.

2. White balance adjustment is not adopted. When shooting at night, if the white balance adjustment is not adopted, the light waves generated by neon lights decorating buildings and landscapes can show more beautiful colors on the photosensitive elements than those seen by naked eyes, and the evening sky can also show more beautiful colors on the photosensitive elements. If automatic white balance adjustment is adopted, the gorgeous colors of the scene will be lost.

Choose the right theme.

The office building is brightly lit at night (F 1 1, 1/2S, ISO 100, focal length 35mm).

The choice of night scene shooting objects mainly considers the beautiful scenery shaped by light and the theme expressed by atmosphere. This is one of the many office buildings in the city. Because it is quite common for urban office workers to work overtime, the lighting effect of office buildings is often better than that of residential buildings. When night falls, most windows of the office building are flashing with lights, and the position, quantity and distribution of light in the picture present a formal aesthetic feeling.

Silhouette in the night

Observing with the naked eye, the scene is not a night scene, but in the photos taken, the brightness of the sky and ground scenery is much lower than that seen with the naked eye, which is very close to the visual impression of the human eye at night. This is the result of dual functions of digital camera exposure latitude and exposure compensation. In the picture, the afterglow of the sky sets off the outline of the main body, and the back light creates a high silhouette of the iron tower, which, together with the houses on the ground, presents an ideal picture with both light and shade contrast and tone levels. The warm color of the lights on the ground contrasts with the blue color of the sky, but it is harmonious. Although the tower can be photographed with a medium focal length lens, a wide-angle lens will help to enhance the grandeur of the scene. The shooting process is as follows:

Communication tower at the top of the mountain at night (F8, 4s, ISO 100, focal length 28mm).

1. The camera is fixed on a tripod.

2. Focus on the tower.

3. The aperture is about F8 or F 1 1 to ensure the depth of field.

4. go against the sky to measure light.

5. Complete the shooting with the 2-second self-timer function.

Night view of downtown area

Pedestrian street in bustling metropolis (F4, 1/60s, ISO 100, focal length 24mm)

When shooting the night scene of downtown, it mainly shows the bustling atmosphere of the city at night, captures the colors, lines and outlines of the scenery, emphasizes the echo of close-range and distant view, and the interaction between street scene and people. Because the scene is large, it is suitable for shooting with a wide-angle lens. Novices can choose night scene mode, and generally can achieve satisfactory results. When shooting hand-held, it is necessary to ensure a certain shutter speed to improve the stability of the camera in order to show a colorful and prosperous street scene. Increasing the ISO value of camera brightness can speed up the shutter speed, which is beneficial to the stability of shooting. At the same time, however, the improvement of ISO will also bring noise to the photos and destroy the image quality.

Busy night scene at the construction site

Busy construction site at night (F4, 30s, ISO 100, focal length 19mm)

In addition to the common colorful and unique buildings, the scene selection for night shooting can sometimes find a new way to shoot some scenes that are inconspicuous but look delicious at night, such as construction sites, brightly lit stadiums and parks at night. When shooting at night, because the sky is dark and the contrast of photos is large, some scenes that destroy the picture are often covered by darkness, and the subject or the main part of the scene, which is highlighted under proper lighting, can bring more vivid impressions to the viewer.

Creative zoom creates explosive effect

The effect of zoom shooting during exposure (f22,5s, ISO 100, focal length 17mm).

Scenes that focus on lighting decoration (such as colored neon lights) can get attractive color patterns. The secret of creating an amplified explosion effect is as follows:

1. Night is a good time to shoot the zoom explosion.

2. The effect of using wide-angle zoom lens is much better than that of using telephoto zoom lens.

3. Fix the camera on the tripod first, so that the zoom lens can be pushed and pulled more smoothly, and then a straight line can be ensured.

4. Adopt a small aperture to ensure the depth of field.

5. The shutter speed should be slow enough to ensure the zoom operation is completed within the exposure time.

6. You can pause for a moment before you start zooming. The pause time depends on the exposure time. For example, 4 seconds exposure, you can open the shutter for 2 seconds before zooming, and highlight the subject in the line where the zoom explosion occurs.

7. First push the lens to the shortest focal length, then release the shutter, and then smoothly pull the zoom ring of the lens to the longest focal length.