Farm field at night

[padrepaul77]

I'm trying to get the hang of nighttime photography, and was recently out practicing. This image isn't all that striking, but I'm looking for advice on exposure length. Next week I'll be out in the Badlands of South Dakota and going out to Devil's Tower, and I'll have a half-full moon, last quarter. I'm hoping to capture some nice night landscape shots, and if anyone has any suggestions on exposure length time I'd appreciate it. I shoot in bulb, with a remote, and experiment with ISO in the 400 or so range. This shot is 37 1/2 seconds or so, under the moon, and maybe it should have been a little longer perhaps to light up the field a tad more? I'm guessing around 30 seconds to a minute are good options, but for any night people out there any help is appreciated. Obviously it's shorter when you have more light in urban areas, but I was looking for more shooting in rural areas. Amazing at how much light the camera picks up, even when you are seemingly far away from a city.

The other shot is a bit too noisy, and was 60 seconds, but even noise ninja couldn't get it quite right - maybe I could try fixing it a bit more, but I don't care for it with the road in front like that. Just post it as an example of kind of what I'm going for with night shots.

Thanks!

[Mad Aussie]

Definitely both are underexposed. ISO 400 may produce noise (any under-exposed shot will often show noise too) on a long exposure depending on your camera so I'd be dropping to ISO 100 - 200 and leaving that shutter open much longer. The tradeoff is blurred stars sometimes though.

You didn't mention your aperture setting which may help. If your subject is far away then you can probably set the fstop quite low, say around 2.8 - 4.5 for instance and still get good depth of field.

How did you focus with so little light? That's always a trick. If the camera was able to find an area of contrast when you focused then on auto or you could see clearly then focus isn't an issue but if not you are going to have to do it manually. If the subject is far enough away you should be able to set the lens on the infinity mark (usually best focus is just off that due to temp and other variants) which I suggest you practice with at dusk when you can still see.

Once you have that down it's just a matter of leaving that shutter open long enough for the settings to get the best shot.

[padrepaul77]

Thanks for the suggestions. I just set it to infinity focus, and I believe the aperture on it was around 5.6. I can go wider than that, so might try that next time. I did a much longer exposure as well, that I re-lit and I think it's slightly better; 107 seconds or just under 2 minutes:

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc4/hs278.snc4/40252_1601861090605_1358417452_1578820_2405259_n.j pg

[Mad Aussie]

As you can see ... the danger with really long exposures when the light level is so low is the the scene starts to look like something you could have taken during the day. When that happens it may be necessary to take several shots at different exposures and blend them together to get it to look as your eye really saw it.

[Yisehaq]

You didn't mention your aperture setting which may help. If your subject is far away then you can probably set the fstop quite low, say around 2.8 - 4.5 for instance and still get good depth of field.

I thought it was the opposite. To get good depth of field, I would usually use smaller fstop? am I wrong?

[Mad Aussie]

The smaller you go with the fstop number (which means the wider open the aperture and therefore more light gets in) ... the less depth of field you get. So f2.8 gets less depth of field than f16. f16 is a much smaller aperture (hole) for the light to pass through.

What I was saying above is that even with a small fstop number like f4.5 you will still get a reasonable amount of depth of field (sharpness throughout your photo) due to the subject being in the distance. Hope that all makes sense now.

[Yisehaq]

Crystal clear!

[padrepaul77]

So, might the best way to fix this be to perhaps cut the sky and paste and blend it in using photoshop?

Thanks,
Paul

[Mad Aussie]

So, might the best way to fix this be to perhaps cut the sky and paste and blend it in using photoshop?

Thanks,
Paul
I don't think I'd try to fix it really. Chalk it up to experience.
If it were me though, I'd have taken several shots at different exposures and then blended them later in PS to get the look I wanted. I can often re-created a far more natural look (as I remember the scene at the time) in this way.

[padrepaul77]

I do have both images, but I'm kind of lost as to how to blend them together into one. Any suggestions or places to look for help?

[Mad Aussie]

I do have both images, but I'm kind of lost as to how to blend them together into one. Any suggestions or places to look for help?

Do you have Photoshop?

[padrepaul77]

Yes, I do have Photoshop Elements 7, and will probably get CS5. I also have a program called "LightZone" that allows me to "zone" sections of the picture, so I can reduce light in parts of it. I can do this obviously too by highlighting the sky and lowering brightness, but there's probably a better way. Any suggestions?

[padrepaul77]

What I ended up doing was using "Exposure Fusion" in Photomatix with two exposures, darker and lighter, then running it through LightZone to darken the sky. I'm not sure if this is a little better, but overall it seems to be. It's so confusing, but hopefully I'm on the right track. I think at night I'll shoot a few different exposures and then merge them and see how they come out. The Layers thing is what really confuses me and throws me for a loop though; I finally figured out how to get two images together, but now need to learn how to blend them. But maybe this work-around will be OK for future night shots? Any further help would be appreciated. Thanks!

http://fatherpaul.smugmug.com/Nature/Summer/Nighttime-on-farm-again-final/982227061_GFVVo-L.jpg

[Mad Aussie]

Ok ... working with layers isn't as difficult as you may think.
Simply open the 2 photos (just start with 2) and then copy and paste one on top of the other. That will produce two layers on your photo ... one is a 'background layer, one is a normal layer.
Now select the top layer and create layer mask ... which is just a click of a button in ther layers palette.
Select that layer mask now, it looks like a white box next to the thumbnail of the photo layer.
By using a brush and black on that layer mask ... you selectively erase the top layer. By changing the size, flow and opacity of the brush you can be quite specific.
Make a mistake ... easy ... change to white and simply brush that portion back in. This is much better than using thr eraser tool because you can undo your mistakes easily at any time.
WHen finished ... merge layers and save.

[padrepaul77]

Thanks for the advice...unfortunately I can't do a layer mask in Elements, apparently just in Photoshop. I'll have to keep tinkering and see what I can get.

[Mad Aussie]

That's VERY slack of Elements!!!!

Found this simulation for layer masking in elements that might help How to Simulate Photoshop's Layer Mask Function in Photoshop Elements (http://graphicssoft.about.com/od/pselements/qt/layermasks.htm)

[padrepaul77]

OK, getting fairly obsessed with getting this down. I still found I liked LightZone's options; I can isolate a color, and just fix it. However, in this image notice the harsh line between the farmhouse and the sky? (Not to mention the farmhouse being lit wrong). Is this just a matter of the exposure going too far in one direction beyond what software can do? Or is there a way to make it nice and smooth?

http://forum.fourthirdsphoto.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=31006&d=1282777336

[Mad Aussie]

Not sure I can advise much further as I don't know the software you are using.

If you wanted to send me the originals I could see what I could do in Photoshop to see if the images are even worth spending so much time on. You may be better to go re-take it or similar scene. Photography needs light. If there wasn't enough in the scene in the first place things get tricky.

[padrepaul77]

Yes, I think it just needs to be re-shot; I'd like to do some more landscape stuff at night though. Was out tonight and the subject unfortunately was all out of focus (a crucifix in a cemetery) so I'll try again in a couple of days.

Thanks!
Paul