Indoor/Night Photography

[kmar415]

I am brand new to the boards and new-ish to photography. I wanted to ask some suggestions/tips on what I should be using for indoor night photography.

 

[tirediron]

A few more details would help: What kind of equipment do you have, what will you be photographing, and where & when will you be doing it?

 

[soufiej]

I am brand new to the boards and new-ish to photography. I wanted to ask some suggestions/tips on what I should be using for indoor night photography.

Lights.

Definitely, lights.

Definitely.

Things that don't move helps too.

 

[Designer]

I agree with soufiej, you should obtain at least one good speedlight, and learn how to use them.

 

[kmar415]

I have a Nikon D3200 with a 18-55mm & 55-200. It is for a reunion, so people. I am not sure of the location I do know it is inside and is happening next weekend. Any suggestions would be great.

 

[kmar415]

Thank you for the advice so far. Much appreciated.

 

[tirediron]

Get a speedlight and read up on the technique of "bouncing flash".

 

[kmar415]

will do that right now. thank you!

 

[soufiej]

I have a Nikon D3200 with a 18-55mm & 55-200. It is for a reunion, so people. I am not sure of the location I do know it is inside and is happening next weekend. Any suggestions would be great.

What sort of shots are you planning on?

Candid with a flash only works once.

People dancing?

Now you've violated the "things that don't move" rule.

 

[kmar415]

I bet I will be violating a lot of photography rules next weekend.
Im sure it will be a combination of candid shots, dancing, and group photos. Its a older group so maybe their moves will be slow

 

[soufiej]

Oh, OK!

Then take along a lot of diabetes meds and a case of Ensure. You'll be the most popular person at the reunion.

 

[bratkinson]

Perhaps the most important 'thing' to have for indoor and night photography is a thorough understanding of the exposure triangle and how to deal with its limitations.

In 12 words or less, AUTO is highly unlikely to create any keepers without a flash. But flash photography has its own learning curve in addition to the exposure triangle. Note, too, that the popup flash on your camera will blind anyone within 4-5 feet, light them up OK at 8-10 feet, and provide close to zero illumination beyond 10 feet.

The big 'problem' is how to get a fast enough shutter speed to freeze subject motion...and camera shake motion as well. People simply standing in one place, even if posed, need at least 1/125th shutter speed to freeze them. Yes, 1/60th will sometimes work, but there will be a fair number of those that have slight blurring due to movement. People dancing? Even faster shutter speeds. Shutter speeds slower than 1/60th will result in a substantial portion of the shots being blurred.

On the other hand, cranking up the shutter speed has to be compensated for by increasing either the aperture (lower f-stop number) of the lens and/or faster ISO speeds. Both of those actions have 'limits' as well, namely a thin DOF resulting from a wide aperture, or too much noise in the picture from too high an ISO for your camera. And don't forget that many zoom lenses available have a variable aperture, such as f3.5 - 5.6, meaning that as one zooms in on a subject, 'wide open' for the aperture is reduced.

As others have already responded, getting a flash is the easiest means of handling low light photography. Shooting without a flash adds considerable challenges and compromises to get the shots you want.

 

[dennybeall]

Set the camera on Auto and get a decent strobe. Point the strobe up a bit and put the diffuser on it. You'll get usable snapshots of the event. Make sure you include everyone you can in the pictures.
The strobe will use batteries so take spares.
The strobe will stop the action and light up the scene. Will it be perfect - No, will it be professional quality - No, but you'll get pictures. Take one or a few and look at them in the camera. Change things if needed.
You, like every one, need to learn. You can't get to professional level by the weekend.

 

[soufiej]

An extra battery.

Definitely, extra battery.

Definitely.

BenGay helps too.

Maybe a monopod.

Batteries and Battery Chargers - Laptop Batteries Digital Camera Batteries Camcorder Batteries Data Cables Power Adapters - BestBatt.com

 

[TCampbell]

An external speedlight flash help enormously. The built-in pop-up flash on most cameras is very tiny and not particularly powerful. It works ok as a "fill" flash (e.g. using it outdoors during the daytime to take photos of subjects at close range -- it fills in the harsh shadows), but not good as a primary light source.

As for which flash is the right flash for you, I'll leave that to the Nikon experts. Nikon makes their own flashes which will fully support Nikon's automatic lighting system (iTTL and the Nikon Creative Lighting System). You can also get 3rd party flashes at substantially cheaper prices, but be careful not to buy junk that won't work out. Some 3rd party flashes are very basic and only work in "manual" mode. That's a very reliable mode but has a learning curve. If the flash supports Nikon's iTTL then it can automatically determine a good power level for you (it fires a pre-flash before the shutter opens to test the lighting, then computes the amount of power needed for the real flash -- finally the shutter opens and the camera takes the shot while the flash fires. All of this happens so quickly you might not even realize it fired twice.)

While you are going to want a speedlight, be careful about "bouncing".

Light looks best when it also includes shadow. Otherwise images look flat. But you don't want intense light offset by deep shadow -- that never looks good. Ideally soft highlights and soft shadows with gradual transitions (not well-defined edges to the shadows) look good.

The "problem" is that when you point a flash directly at your subject, the flash itself is tiny and it creates a light with a well-defined edge on the shadows. So if there's a way to diffuse the light -- and make it appear as if the light originates from a broad source instead of a pinpoint source your shadow transitions are gradual (softer) and more attractive (think about how a "lamp shade" softens the light of the lamp instead of a bare "light bulb").

One way to make a pinpoint flash appear to originate from a broad light source is to bounce the flash off a surface... such as a ceiling. Now the light rains down from above (or wash in from the side if you use a wall) and comes from all around (well... somewhat). But there are two things to watch for... (1) if the ceiling (or wall if you bounce the flash off a wall) is not "white" then the color of the light on the subject will take on whatever color that surface was. If the ceiling was really wood paneling... your subjects will look orange. If the ceiling was paint black (industrial) then bouncing isn't going to work at all. So you want a "white" ceiling and preferably not very high (10' or even 12' ceilings are probably ok. 20' ceilings... not so ok. And the seconding thing... (2) if the subject is standing too close then the light will rain down from nearly directly above their head -- instead of from some point a bit in front of the subject. Since eyes are recessed back under the brow, this causes the eyes to be in shadow even though the forehead and face are otherwise nicely exposed. You get "raccoon eyes" -- not a good look. To get around this (and again... this assumes your ceiling is suitable for doing bounce flash) you can feather in a bit of light by using a "bounce card". Some flashes have a pop-up bounce card... but they are usually too small to be very useful (they do help put a "catch light" reflection (a sparkle) in the subject's eyes -- which is attractive if the shape is good). You can get larger bounce cards. The "Rogue Flashbender" is an example of a commercial bounce card.

There are LOTS of flash-modifiers that are basically milky white caps that go on top of the flash... but they barely increase the area and not really enough to be useful (and they can't help you control direction.)