Five advanced skills of light track photography

On a busy night, as long as the exposure time is slightly extended, it is easy to take a fascinating track image. Photographer chris smith is an old hand in this field. He shared with us five advanced technologies for shooting optical tracks on the website. Photographers who want to try to shoot a good trajectory but don't know how to start, come and see this article.

1, showing the atmosphere

Since we want to shoot the light track, we should try our best to shoot it with a little atmosphere, so that people can see it clearly at first sight. First of all, after finding the scenes where mobile light sources often appear, shoot with a super wide-angle lens and try to get close to the light source you want to shoot. If you want to shoot busy streets and tracks at night, you can consider moving the tripod to make the camera closer to the road. In addition, please remember to put the camera down and shoot from bottom to top. The advantage of low-angle shooting is that it can strengthen the momentum of buildings and backgrounds.

2. Visualization of optical trajectory

Many seemingly monotonous and boring compositions will become interesting immediately if they can be added to the light track. Before pressing the shutter, we can observe the background and terrain, and then decide how to visualize the light track, such as mastering the direction, color and brightness of the light track, and then set the appropriate shutter speed and use the correct composition method. If you have the opportunity to shoot in a high-rise building, you can try to find a road with a large flow of people, lengthen the exposure time, and add a car streamer to the original dull night scene to enhance the visual tension of the photo.

3. Emphasize the optical track

Try to find a completely black road environment, so as to shoot clean light track works. For example, suburban roads or mountain roads have long exposure time and insufficient background exposure. At this time, the clear and obvious optical trajectory will be highlighted. In addition, in the post-production process, we can try to adjust the dark part of the photo to black tone, and only strengthen the bright details of the light track separately, which can enhance its unique effect.

4, don't need a car

In principle, as long as there is a light source, there is a chance to shoot the light track effect, so bicycles, motorcycles, trains and even. The light sticks in the parade can be used as props to shoot ideal light track works. Different vehicles and light sources have different motion modes. Some are very regular, and some are randomly changed, which will be more interesting than taking a car light rail. You might as well try it yourself if you have a chance.

5. Create a light track

Without a suitable light source, it is not necessarily impossible to shoot the light track, and sometimes you have to do it yourself. Find a safe and empty place, set up a camera and tripod, set up a long exposure and countdown selfie, then jump in the car and drive to the camera to show you interesting routes and directions, and also shoot amazing light track works. Of course, having friends to help shoot is also one of the ways to improve the success rate.