Night shooting

Donk1166

Donk1166

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What's the best way to focus when shooting at night?

I find it easy enough if there's something obvious to focus on manually. But when I'm shooting distant panorama stuff at night I find it hard to get the shot pin sharp.

Help
 
TordFuglstad said:
You need to take several test shots to get it right, if you have the distance imprinted on the lens it should be easier.
Click to expand...

How would you find what distance to set it to then or would you just go for infinity?
 
Not sure how well it would work at distance, but i always carry a high powered torch to illuminate the subject, then use the autofocus to get the focus, and then set the camera back to manual focus
 
I think the trial & error approach is best. The focus point was too far away for my torch (500m+).

It's my own fault as I didn't zoom in when checking my shots. Obviously they looked fine on the little screen :0(
 
If there is a distant streetlight, then use live view to make the point of light as small as possible!
The important thing is to use manual focus so that it doesn't change when you recompose, or take multiple shots. You only need to refocus when you zoom.

If there are no distant streelights, then...
With wider focal lengths (up to about 70mm), you only need to send a friend into the landscape 100m or more and focus on the torch in live view. Everything will be sharp up to the horizon.
Another way is to use a laser pointer, find the dot in live view and tweak the focus ring to make the dot as small as possible. This works extremely well and just for a laugh I demonstrated I could check focus nearly a mile away. The green lasers used for star pointing are the best as you can where the beam is heading.
 
how about a torch? shine on a subject or you can put on liveview and focus a third way in. cant see the scene total no light at all, if there is no light at all your not going to get anything lol

if your shooting at a small aperture or a wide angel it wont matter that much as the field of focus will be massive
 
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