Night photography

[lyorn]

I have a very specific question, and all the pages I found by looking for combinations of "photography, bad light, night, documentary" are either tutorials focusing on artistic pictures with relatively simple equipment, or too technical for me to apply the info to the situation in my story:

Comments

[leilay]

I'd say there's a decent chance of this guy getting shots. He'll be taking frames per second (3 or so, probably by your pre-digital) with a heavy telephoto lens. I'm not sure on the lenses available then, but this thing should be far bigger than the camera (like the ones NFL photogs use). He'd probably be using high ISO film for the event anyway, so he should be good there.

So equipment: Tripod. Telephoto lens (bigger than camera, far longer). No flash if he doesn't want to be noticed - lens will be bigger and heavier for it, though.

Skill is a must or else the photos will be too dark.

HTH! I take photos in the dark all the time, but not telephoto. He'll have to be *very* careful not to jostle the camera while taking photos, too - he'll want a handheld 'remote' shutter release, too.

[leilay]

For what it's worth, most remotes look like a detonator with one button. Not sure how they worked then, but now it's a half-press to focus and full press to take the photo.

He'd probably be using 3200 or 6400 iso film - the kind that *totally* gets ruined in airport x-ray machines and has to be hand-checked.

[little_dumpling]

if he was at a festival, taking pictures at night, i doubt he would have a telephoto lens. telephoto lens' take in less light and therefore need a much much brighter environment. even with a very high ISO film, it would be pretty hard for him to get much to show up if he was far away from the subject and had a telephoto lens.

the picture would be so much smaller, but you'd be surprised how much detail analog film gets, and how big they could blow it up.

point to the author: he probably wouldn't have set up so far away from the festival if he wanted pictures of it. he would most likely be walking around and in the people snapping shots.

[lyorn]

the picture would be so much smaller, but you'd be surprised how much detail analog film gets, and how big they could blow it up.

Good point. Would that apply even to high ISO? How grainy is "grainy"?

[nanini]

I don't think the narrator is the photographer.

[lyorn]

why does he have "a good professional camera" with him if he doesn't know much about photography?

Reporter =/= narrator of that scene.

[nanini]

The dark is your worst enemy here. For a clear shot he'd have to either have a VERY sensitive film (high ISO numbers, like 3200, or he could crank the ISO up but it'll get very grainy) or get some long shots (the shutter stays open for a little longer so that more light comes in). It's still hard, since there will probably be movement, so unless they're still (like organizing stuff in a corner or sitting while preparing their stuff) all you'll get is a lot of motion blur.
The fact that it's far away means you'll need a telephoto lens, which will make things harder since pictures made with this lens tend to be darker.

In a 200 m distance there no use for a flash because it wouldn't reach it.

The camera would have a huge lens, as mentioned above and if not on a tripod just make him put the camera on some kind of still surface. If you don't have a remote and he doesn't want to jostle the camera he can use the timer, but I don't that would be the case given the circumstances.

[ladyamber]

Speaking as a photographer who was taught the basics of analog photography before I was even allowed to touch digital equipment, at the very least the guy would have a zoom lens and tripod. Any good photojournalist would have at least one zoom lens to allow him to take a clear, far-away picture. The lens should also be capable of opening to an f2.8 or lower. What this means for a novice photographer is the lower the F-stop, the more light the lens lets in. If you can get the lens open to an f2.8 or lower, the more chance you've got to get a clearer action shot at night

[ladyamber]

As people mentioned above, a telephoto lens would probably be helpful. The reason I was hesitant to suggest it to begin with was because I'm not entirely certain he was expecting to take shots that far away, and while telephotos are very common in sports photography, I don't see many of them in regular photojournalism

[ladyamber]

Something that my photography professor took in Spain during the Running of the Bulls; low light, fast action, the only difference is the distance. He was standing on a balcony above when he shot this photograph.

Notice some of the contrast problems; he let the bulls fade to black to catch the tones in the man's face.

John Kimmich-Javier: Moment of Truth

[lyorn]

Thank you, that is very useful and gives me some ideas for more research.

[twoseamfastball]

Eeesh, I think that if you can move your balcony any closer, you really, REALLY should-- 200m is almost two football fields, even a really big telephoto is going to have difficulty with that in good light, let alone at night. I know nature photogs who work with comparable distances, but they digiscope, which your character can't exactly do

[twoseamfastball]

Uh, I also see a bunch of people have suggested remotes-- I honestly cannot imagine a photojournalist using a remote to shoot action, especially pre-digital and under such poor conditions as these, where he'll be adjusting his settings like crazy to try to compensate.

He would definitely use one if he was taking longer exposures (which would give you some very nice blurs, or some very nice backgrounds) or if he had cooperative subjects willing to hold still, but if he's shooting moving subjects the kind of camera shake you'd get from pushing the shutter button yourself would really be the least of his issues.

[lyorn]

Wouldn't a remote be only a button to press? (I vaguely remember seeing someone using one some time ago.) I'll look that up...

[twoseamfastball]

The point of a remote is that you can use it to snap a picture without shaking the camera at all (when you press the shutter button on the actual camera, no matter how steady your hands are, it moves the camera a little bit), because the remote is connected to the camera with a wire, so you're not touching the actual camera body. People use them for super close up shots, where the tiniest bit of camera shake is visible, or long exposures, where camera shake will show up in the picture, or sometimes for posed portraits.

Photojournalists, especially if they're shooting people, ESPECIALLY if they're trying to get clear shots of people at night, are not shooting long exposures. A remote would be pointless. I've mainly worked with sports photography, but the thought of even my regular reporter photography friends going about with a remote is kind of hilarious. ;P