Night shots

[janedoe]

Another fetish of mine. I have seen some shots though where there is good long exposure blur, but the car or whatever, is still in focus.

What exposure and what not would you use to achieve that effect?

[SSSchwing]

Limited knowledge, but i think you mean 'panning'?

The other way I found is to ride in a car next to the one you want to shoot. Much easier IMO LOL

this is BLATENT PLAGERISM from another forum, but it seems like good advice -

set the centre focus point on the car a fair distance out from where I want the shot and track the car through the viewfinder. As the car approaches the point at which I want the shot I press to pre-focus and being set in AIServo mode let the camera continue tracking the car. When the car is almost on the spot I will depress the sutter button and fire off three shots, one before the point, one at the point and one after the point at which I wanted the shot.

Settings wise, I think it was around 1/80 shutter speed....although I guess it all depends on the lighting and conditions?



EDIT you may or may not want to ignore my reply here, i just realised you meant at night.... hmmm

[Knawful]

Flash set to rear. (goes off just before shutter closes)

[janedoe]

you can do that? how do you do that? I was wondering if it was a PS thing - I dunno - but gee it looked impressive! and I want one with these trains.

[methd]

in layman terms - just put it on shutter priority at about 1/80 to 1/100 and 'pan' the focal point. This means keep the camera focussed on the subject while the mirror is flipped up. Everything else should blurr except the subject.

the longer the shutter, the more background and wheel blur (motion) u get but more chance the subject will also be out of focus.

[methd]

ooh, i think she means rear curtain flash. that's a flash function on the camera. most cameras should have it.

[Knawful]

One of the flash setting's should be named "rear"..Using the onboard and the command dial it goes: flash/ red eye/ red eye slow/ slow/ rear (presuming all Nikon's are the same)

I could be wrong.....

[janedoe]

hmmm ok - but how does that work for night shots with the long exposures?

[foonji]

yep, as for night... set to Second Curtain flash / Rear Flash so the flash fires at the end of the exposure, leaving nice light trails...

i got some here i did by a red light camera one night, i'll see if i can find it and post.

[foonji]

ok... first is equiv to 1st Curtain Sync and 2nd, 2nd Curtain Sync

i say equiv, because when i did these, i didnt have the 580... only a old film flash which i was manually firing... but you get the idea

[janedoe]

Alllllright! I found that part in the manual - thanks for the heads up. I can see this is going to be another ulcer but hey, fun one.

Many thanks!

[arthurking83]

Hey foonji.. nice idea!

I bet you stood there all night flashing cars, as they drove through the intersection thinking they got flashed by the red-light camera....





something to do for the next time I get bored....