Fireworks anyone?

[03civicdx]

This is the first time i have even thought about shooting fireworks so i have a few questions...

1) what lens out of my equipment listed in my sig. would YOU use for this? and why?

2) will the XSi handle the 1600 iso with lil noise?

3) any advice on what setting to use? and why?

Thanks advance. :mrgreen:

 

[Kondro86]

1.) I would say use your widest lens, so you dont miss anything.

2.) I think you should probably use a lower ISO about 100 or 200.

3.) I would say there are no general settings, the light is changing constantly. Its more trial and error.

Hope this helps, post some results. I will be putting some up later or tomm. -Danny

 

[03civicdx]

1.) I would say use your widest lens, so you dont miss anything.

2.) I think you should probably use a lower ISO about 100 or 200.

3.) I would say there are no general settings, the light is changing constantly. Its more trial and error.

Hope this helps, post some results. I will be putting some up later or tomm. -Danny

yeah I just looked at some exif data on a few nice pics someone posted last year on a local forum and they used ISO 100 so i guess thats the route to go lol... thanks for your input and i will post them up as long as they come out half way decent

 

[Bitter Jeweler]

After having shot 174 pics of fireworks last night...with an XSi, and seeing some shot with an iPhone...

I used my 18-55mm, at 18mm, to include the launch site. I got almost all the shots, and only clipped a few of the largest "blooms", (I don't know what to call an individual explosion). I used ISO 100. I also used a remote and varied the shutter time in BULB mode. Almost all of my shots show the color streaks of the explosion, while the iPhone shots captured the "moment in time" of the display. In the future I will vary my shutter to as fast as I can operate the remote (open/close shutter), to capture the "moment in time" to the longer exposure to capture the streaks to get more of a mix.

I did zoom in for a few shots to get a full frame of explosion, versus capturing the whole scene. It was fun, fast paced, and ultimately rewarding. My biggest tip for you is to get your best guess on focus to infinity. Also, I varied the aperture between f/11 and/f16. Got imidiate feedback via the histogram of blown areas at the larger aperture, I pretty much settled on f/13.

Good luck and have fun!

 

[javier]

Here ya go.
Photographing Fireworks Tutorial « Enticing the Light