Christmas lights

[cdbbdc]

How do you take photos of Christmas lights and make them sparkle?
Is it a technique or a filter?

 

[Big Mike]

Define 'sparkle'.

You can use a star/cross filter to give them lines like stars etc.

 

[dsp921]

A small aperture will give lights that star effect. F/16 or smaller. Obviously, a tripod will help.

 

[ToadSlayer]

A star filter is a cheap and easy way to get that sparkle. There are usually plenty of used filters going cheap on Ebay.

Alternative - throw a bucket of water over them, while your mother-in-law hacks at the cable with an old saw blade .................... BANG !!!

 

[van halen]

Aperture F/16, ISO 100, Tripod would help or you can just put your camera on the couch, BDD it works pretty well.

 

[KVRNut]

Try a cross screen filter for that sparkle effect.

 

[KmH]

When you use a small lens aperture, the 'sparkles' are called diffraction spikes.

The effect can also be done post process in Photoshop.

 

[eric-holmes]

Keith, I searched YouTube for a tutorial on that process. I couldn't find any. Is there a filter for it or is it certain steps?

 

[Edsport]

Here is some stars. Open the photo of one in photoshop and select all, copy and paste onto your image. You can resize it with transform tool. Go to layers and change blend mode to screen, it will get rid of the black around the star and only the star will remain on your image. Download starlights.zip from Sendspace.com - send big files the easy way

Here is some photoshop star brushes. Download StarsPhotshopBrushes.zip from Sendspace.com - send big files the easy way