Night landscape/buildings help

Paul870

Paul870

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To try and rekindle my interest in photography I am aiming to get some half decent pictures of Liverpool dock front / city.
Now Ive only ever tried to take night pictures once before and didn't have an idea what I was doing.
I think I may be limited by my equipment although I'm not sure so thought bestto ask!

I have a canon 500d
18-55 is lens
50mm
SLR gorilla pod

I have this evening off, and as I've been working nights It'd be a good night to start!
I am looking to obtain a tripod, although itl be next week or so before I do, so for now the pod will have to suffice!

Firstly what base settings should I be looking to use?
Any advice for long exposure shots, I'd like to get some with passing cars.

Should I expect to get some good pictures with what equipment I have?

Any help with this is greatly appreciated as currently I've got a lot of enthusiasm and inspiration to get some nice ideas.
 
30 seconds at iso100 on a sturdy tripod should do it. I'm not sure how sturdy a gorillapod is so you may need a cable/wireless release also.

Rgds
 
You have the ideal camera to work this out for yourself. Get your shot set up and switch to the live veiw mode. Now as your not worried about camera shake (as it should be sturdy on the pod) trun your ISO to 100 and then look at the screen. In aperture priority move the wheel to adjust the fstop. Your looking for a small opening say f16 max. As you do this your exposure will go up. Obviously you have to have a cable release to get more than 30 sec but you can adjust that with your aperture but with scapes you dont really want to do below say f11

Also you really want to be taking photos just as the sun goes down. That golden hour just after sunset will give you a nce blue sky rather than a black sky or as with the docks and Peir Head brown clouds. Its the reflection from the sodium lights.

I am from your neck of the woods so if you ever fancy meeting up I need to get back down to the dock to take some more photos and that will be an incentive.
 
Digifrog said:
30 seconds at iso100 on a sturdy tripod should do it.
Click to expand...

Meanwhile, I have a piece of string that's the perfect length :naughty:

Lit buildings may need less time than 30s. Light trails might not pass fully through the frame in 30s. If you want to do anything creative with depth of field (either shallow or deep) aperture settings will impact on shutter speed (or ISO).

Start off at any given settings and once you've got your DoF as you want it if the image is too dark increase the exposure duration and if it's too bright use a shorter exposure time. Take several frames in each position and if you're into post processing you can blend your fave bits and if not you can view the exif data to understand what works and what doesn't.
 
Thank you for the advice! I'd definitely be interested in meeting up, I've been looking around to see who's from the area only seen a few however!
Drop me a PM and we can organise something

I'll see what I can come up with and hopefully post in the landscape section once processed.
 
Might also be worth activating mirror lock up too as this will also minimize camera movement on long exposures.

Also, others have mentioned using a remote, in lieu of a remote, set the camera to 2 second delay.

What should happen then is once you've composed/focused the shot, press the sutter release and the mirror will lift up, 2 seconds will pass and then exposure will then begin a few moments after.

This should all mean the camera is about as still as it can be :)
 
I was also thinking of using the delay timing, so at least that's confirmed it will help!

How do I go about setting the mirror lock on my slr? This is the first time I've heard of that. I've had a quick gander through the settings and can't seem to find anything which describes that.
 
Paul870 said:
I was also thinking of using the delay timing, so at least that's confirmed it will help!

How do I go about setting the mirror lock on my slr? This is the first time I've heard of that. I've had a quick gander through the settings and can't seem to find anything which describes that.
Click to expand...

It should be in the custom functions menu but not sure exactly where on the 450D
 
Mirror lockup:

custom functions (c.Fn) which is in the 3rd yellow menu or the second to last over all menu.
then scroll right to option 9. click set, then scroll down to enable and press set again! When you go to take a photo, when you press the shutter button once, the mirror will lock up and the view finder will be inoperable, press it again to take the picture!

Hope thats clear! :)
 
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