Night Photos Help

[SituationNormal]

I'm taking a digital photography class at the local community college, and the assignment for this week is night photos. These are three of the better ones that I have taken, but I'm still unhappy with them. So I'm asking what I could have done differently to make them stand out. Any help would be appreciated.

1.

The Sand Man by Situation Normal, on Flickr
2.

Three beacons at sea by Situation Normal, on Flickr
3.

The Sand Man by Situation Normal, on Flickr

 

[tirediron]

Okay, maybe to start with, you could tell us why you're not happy with them? I don't see any glaring issues technically. Composition isn't necessarily the way I would have approached it...

 

[SituationNormal]

Pic 1 seems grainy to me. I shot it with 800 ISO, but when I tried other ISO settings the images were just too dark. I played with other Aperture settings as well and they also went dark.

Pic 2, I guess that I expected more water detail. I held the shutter open for 300 seconds, and although there is some "glimmer" in the reflection on the water I expected to see more of the horizon. It's usally pretty overcast up here in Washington, but chose a night when the moon and stars were out. The sky was pretty well lit.

Pic 3 is also grainy. Not as bad as pic 1, but it's pretty noticeable especially around the lights. It was also shot with 800 ISO.

I guess what I am looking for is, is what could I have done differntly not with the composition, but with the camera?

 

[shootermcgavin]

Put the camera on a tripod or set it down, it doesn't look like the boats rare moving that much. 5 minutes isn't all that long of an exposure for night time shots. Maybe try 15 minutes for the second one. It will probably need more the last time I shot the moon bouncing off the water I did 15 minutes and you could see the water very well. I prefer shooting in (B)ulb more at night. I lock the trigger button and come back when the time is up. If you don't have a trigger they only cost like $15 and are well worth it.

 

[DiskoJoe]

you could try turning the exposure up some

 

[ann]

keep your ISo as low as possible. Underexposure creates more noise and with night images, there are always some areas that are underexposed.

The first one looks very nice. number 2 didn't get enough exposure so it is hard to tell what is going on, at least on my monitor

For your first attempt, I think you have done very well.

 

[SituationNormal]

Thanks for the comments Shooter, Joe and Ann. Shooter, I did most of everything that you listed... tripod, Bulb and trigger button. Locking the button is a great idea. I knew that I wanted a 5 minute exposure, but let my thumb slip on the first couple of attempts. A rubber band could have fixed this. I thought that 5 minutes was quite a long time, but I'll try a longer exposure next time.

Joe and Ann, I didn't realize that underexposing could increase noise. I knew that using too high of an ISO would cause noise, but didn't realize that underexposing could too. This is something that I'll definately try again.

 

[Compaq]

I quite like #2. Just crop some of the excess on top away, maybe a little below the reflections, and you've got a really cool, simplistic image. Me gusta!

 

[fotoshooter]

I would convert the first image to B&W then play with curves and levels with it and the third image till you get what you like best..

The second image as has already been pointed out would benefit from slight cropping.

I downloaded the 2 images and applied curves with a touch of sharpening but am unable to upload attachments to show you the results. This greatly improved the overall look.
One more thing the square crop does not work well with these two images..

 

[SituationNormal]

I would love to see your edits fotoshooter. If you want you can upload them to your flickr account and link to them from here, or email them to me and I'll do the same.

 

[fotoshooter]

I would love to see your edits fotoshooter. If you want you can upload them to your flickr account and link to them from here, or email them to me and I'll do the same.

Images removed..

My edits were done in Gimp on PCLinuxOS desktop

 

[SituationNormal]

Nice edits Colyn. Especially with the second image. I think that it's time to go back and do a bit more editing for me.

 

[fotoshooter]

Nice edits Colyn. Especially with the second image. I think that it's time to go back and do a bit more editing for me.

Thanks
I spent about 30 seconds on each one so if you take a little time you should make them even better..