First serious Night time shots

[Tyson]

I have not tried too many night shots but here are a few. Tell me what you think.

 

[myopia]

relatively snap-shotty

 

[Tyson]

relatively snap-shotty

What would you have done different?

 

[Amber24]

What are these taken for? I mean a newspaper, yourself, etc? Was that your car?

 

[Digital Matt]

The one thing I would say for you to try and do in the future, is to be aware of everything in the scene you are photographing, and not just the subject you are focusing on. In general, these shots have a cluttered feel, and it's hard to get a sense of what you are trying to say, and what the real focus is.

Pay attention to everything in your viewfinder, including all 4 sides, foreground, and background. Watch for things near the edge of the frame, bright colors in the background that distract, and other clutter that takes away from your focal point.

 

[LaFoto]

From what I understand, Tyson, you work on that fire truck?
And you took these photos to maybe go with a report on the accident that you were called to?
Or to go into the fire fighters' own photo album on things they did?

Or is it that you want to really explore the field of photography and so far your only chance to really go out at all times of the day has been while with the fire fighters, so they always happen to be in your photos?

If the second applies, you might want to a) watch all the things that Matt refers to, and b) observe a couple of other things that help while taking photos at night (provided the scene you want to capture allows for it), such as:
- best choose a smaller aperture and longer exposure than have the camera automatics go for the widest open aperture to shorten exposure
- always bring a tripod for camera stability
- don't let the camera fire its inbuilt flash

 

[Tyson]

What are these taken for? I mean a newspaper, yourself, etc? Was that your car?

The photos I take at a fire scene are for my guys and myself. Kind of practice realy, I am still learning to usw my DSLR. I realy realy want to learn how to take pictures like you guys here at TPF. I figure practice makes perfict? I thought these 4 pictures were pertty go realy, IMO. What I like to see and what you like to see are different. I am interested in landscape and travel photography, that is what I am practiceing for. I work several hours at my full time job and am a part time plus a volunteer firefighter/emt. I just happen to have my camera on this run. I don't have alot of time to shoot or travel right now so if I see a photo op what ever it may be I take it. A tripod is a nono at on a fire scene so scratch that out. Check out my web page I also do low level aerial photography from a remote control airplane. I keep posting pictures to this forum so I can lear composition and see if what I am seeing is liked by other people than myself. As far as the clutter I can't move fire aperatous for a photo shoot LOL. Thanks for the replys keep them coming.

 

[Tyson]

Also I shot in M mode all the time I had my WB set on indor FL. So that didn't help much.

 

[Digital Matt]

As far as the clutter I can't move fire aperatous for a photo shoot LOL. Thanks for the replys keep them coming.

That's why you have to be careful with your composition. You CAN compose around that stuff. Photo journalists do this all the time. They arrive at a scene that is total chaos, and bring the viewer right to the point, without any unneccesary information.

 

[LaFoto]

Yes, well, while you cannot move things around at a fire scene, you could however move YOURSELF around when you set out to take the photos and could then choose the frame better and eliminate the clutter IN YOUR FRAME. That is what makes photos so interesting: they focus on something that would in our normal vision be only one thing out of many that we perceive, it picks it out, highlights it, makes it special, gives it "honours" ... you get my idea?

And honestly, how can we help if you say that YOU see in your photos all that you want to see, and when you say that actually you are quite happy with the outcome of your photography ... in my ears that sounds like you think you "are there already" and don't REALLY need our help any more... :scratch:

The first has very many technical flaws. It is very noisy, one step to the right could have left the lights of the police car out of your frame ... but if you say you find these absolutely ok for your liking ... then what more can we say?

 

[Tyson]

The police lights I put in there, should I have croped them out? I figured it added to it not took anything away?


"And honestly, how can we help if you say that YOU see in your photos all that you want to see, and when you say that actually you are quite happy with the outcome of your photography ... in my ears that sounds like you think you "are there already" and don't REALLY need our help any more... "

I want to see if I can improve myself and and my pictures. I did not mean to offend you buy saying "I liked them" I want to shot photos that someone else would like to see.

 

[Tyson]

What about Picture #4 do you like it? It's not cluttered no bad color. Do you think it would be news paper worthy?

 

[Digital Matt]

My biggest problem with #4 is, what are you trying to show? What is this a picture of? I've deduced that it's a fire truck, but what about the car in the background? It's too small for me to even tell it's damaged. You have a lot of blank space at the left side which just leaves me wondering why?

#4 actually has lots of small issues as well, if you look closely at it. There is a tangent where the light on the left side of the fire truck meets the car in the background. The text on fire truck is cut off and I have no idea what it says. There are also some tangents with the truck and the bottom of the frame. My eyes are drawn to the center of the frame, where the lights of the truck are. Our eyes are naturally drawn to the brightest parts of the image, but when I get there, it's non informative, and a little boring being centered.

If you go to your local library and pick up a book on basic composition, it will help a lot. There are lots of things to be aware of when composing a photo. There are no "rules" as to what to do, but there are reasons why certain things look good, and others don't. Why certain things engage the viewer, and why others don't. It's a good idea to learn those concepts.

 

[Tyson]

Thank you again, do you know of any books by name or just pick one?

 

[Digital Matt]

A quick search on amazon.com brings up quite a few books. I'm sure any one of them would be a good place to start. See if your local library has any.

[ame]http://amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw/105-0278398-6245212?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=photography+composition&Go.x=0&Go.y=0&Go=Go[/ame]

Also, I highly recommend any book by John Hedgecoe, as a general guide to photography. Your library should have at least one.

[ame]http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_b/002-7287970-8538424?url=node%3D1000%2C1%2C2020&field-keywords=hedgecoe&Go.x=0&Go.y=0&Go=Go[/ame]