SHOOTING
AT
NIGHT
Newcastle/Gateshead and the River Tyne
2 ISO 100
You might think that you’d need a high
ISO for a night scene like this. However,
using a low ISO value will reduce the risk of
image noise soft ening the fi ne details in the
resulti ng photo. The one big drawback to
using a low ISO for night scenes is that you
invariably need to use a long shutt er speed.
1 Aperture f/11
A relati vely small aperture was required
to produce suffi cient depth of fi eld. This
also had the happy accident of creati ng a
star eff ect around the light of the various
streetlamps in the scene.
3 Shutt er speed 15 sec.
The combinati on of low light, small aperture
and a low ISO fi gure required the use of
a lengthy shutt er speed of 15 seconds.
This meant that the camera needed to be
mounted on a tripod to avoid camera shake.
The long exposure has blurred the water of
the river fl owing through the shot.
4 Night shooti ng
Oddly enough the best ti me to shoot night
scenes isn’t at night! Shooti ng at dusk -
approximately twenty minutes aft er sunset
- means that there is generally sti ll colour
and light in the sky. This helps to defi ne the
shapes of buildings on the skyline.