Photography help...Please

[LovinPowell]

We are in the process of redecorating our office and we decided that pictures of the area would be nice to have hanging on the lobby wall. I thought that a nighttime shot of our city would be cool. So last night I took a few pictures. I am not much of an expert, but have really started to enjoy photography lately. To get a good picture I will usually try many different settings, and take 10 or so shots with each setting. (not knowing what I'm really doing), so I could end up with as many as 100 pictures of the same thing using 10 different settings. I am familiar with the photography terms, such as f-stop, aperture, ISO, etc. but don't know really what they all mean, how they relate to each other and the like. Here are four pictures that I took last night. Any helpful hints as to what I could do to make them better would be greatly appreciated. Oh yeah, I have a Canon Rebel XTI, and love it.

This one was taken, using auto, no flash settings.


I can't remember what the settings were for this, only that the shutter was open for about 30 seconds (seemed like forever).


Unknown settings:


I think that this was regular auto setting.

[zad0030]

Is that a UFO in the second picture?

[da.bell]

He lives in UT not Phoenix, AZ.

[hoopykat]

Let me try and remember back to my SLR camera days...

ISO was used to refer to film speeds in the days of 35mm film cameras. The higher the ISO number, the faster the film speed. Higher numbers (400/800/1000) were better for action photography like sports and movements. Slower speeds (100/200) were more for general purpose, everyday photography, like birthdays, and flash photography etc. The slower films tended to have richer colors, but blurred with any motion. The higher ISO settings for digital cameras mean they are better at capturing action photography, with less blurring. F-stops deal with how much light is allowed through the shutter, with lower numbers (f4 lets in more light than f1.4, and f22 is the 'slowest'). These numbers also need to factor in the focal length...the length of the lens you're using, in millimeters. Confused?

Me too.

So...use this as a guideline...for night or low light photography situations, use a lower ISO number and shutter speed, and use a f-stop around 22 or higher. Action photography (like in capturing wakeboarding or surfing) use a higher ISO speed and shutter speed, with a lower f-stop if need be...something like 2.8 or so. You'll notice the nighttime pics you took with slower shutter speeds show way more detail than the faster speeds that only show the lights. If you're going to use slower shutter speeds, a tripod definitely helps image stabilization.

Google f-stop settings for more information if need be....hope this helps.

-Mike

[spharis]

hoopy pretty much hit it all.

If you want to make some really awesome pictures try this:
tripod the camera
shoot in .raw mode
set the camera to manual exposure
set the iso to the lowest setting allowed (this avoids noise)
shoot several photos bracketed by changing the shutter speed (NOT the aperture)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bracketing
I would take about 6 just to be sure I had enough to work with

take those over to photoshop and run them through the "automate->merge HDR" filter. Downsample it, then adjust the histogram to make it look like you like it.

Sweetness occurs. One of these days I am going to get an EOS and rock a bunch of these out. In full on sunlight you aren't going to get much results as there isn't enough contrast, so what you can do is fake the HDR using a few layers and some overlays. You'll get results like these faking it.


and using the HDR method above, you'll get results like these (this guy takes great shots and really has an eye for composition).

[LovinPowell]

If you want to make some really awesome pictures try this:
tripod the camera
shoot in .raw mode

Do you know if the Canon XTI will take a picture in .raw mode? How can I tell if it will?

[noworries]

Do you know if the Canon XTI will take a picture in .raw mode? How can I tell if it will?

Yes, it will do RAW mode -3888x2592 pixels, about 10MPixels. You'll have to pull out the cheat sheet or wade through the menus. I don't recall off hand how to change it. I think you have to run the raw photo file through the Digital Photo Professional software before you can do anything else with it. Again, you may have to consult the manual.

For nighttime photos like yours, use a tripod, set the ISO as low as possible, set the aperture all the way open (numerically small f-stop), and play with shutter speeds to get your best balance between detail, overexposure, bright spots, etc. Also, set the lens to manual focus.

[noworries]

Actually just looked at the manual. RAW or the "L" modes are suggested for A3 print sizes. Hit the menu button and select Quality under the #1 menu to select your quality. Also, they suggest using higher ISOs under low light conditions. Makes sense in retrospect, but you still should use as low an ISO as you can get by with to minimize graininess. Set the ISO by using the UP arrow hard key labeled "ISO."

Try setting the camera to "AV" mode (aperture priority) set the aperture wide open, and see what shutter speed it chooses. You can then set the camera to "M" mode and manually set the aperture wide open and select shutter speeds around the camera's selection to see the impact.

[LovinPowell]

take those over to photoshop and run them through the "automate->merge HDR" filter. Downsample it, then adjust the histogram to make it look like you like it.

So how do you do that in photoshop?

[Coach]

I am just getting into the DSLR thing and loving it. Here is a cool group on Flickr that does mini assignments and you can get some good feed back on your shots.

http://flickr.com/groups/techguy/dis...7602922287543/

Also there are 2 great books by the same guy Digital photography by scott kelby

[Coach]

Seems like you need a very low ISO 80 to 100 with a low F stop and and longer shutter speed 1-15 seconds. Be interesting to see what the results look like.

[ktmrider1]

These are shots I took of Miami from our Condo with a low F stop a slow shutter speed

[spharis]

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/hdr.shtml

[ktmrider1]

Here is an interesting article on photographing boats:

http://www.boatersworld.com/p/?cmd=S...hoto-boat.html

[LovinPowell]

Good article.

KTM: In your other post you mentioned a low f-stop. So here is the stupid question, is a low f-stop a low number or high number I keep forgetting if the f-stop has an inverse relationship or not.

Thanks.