Received conflicting info about aperture setting and night skyline shots

[dblb48]

So Im heading downtown next weekend, and I really need some help. I will be shooting some night skyline shots (one traditional skyline view and one from within the city with street lights etc). I am shooting B&W iso400(all I have access to). I need some advice as I have heard conflicting suggestions, specifically concerning aperture setting. I was originally told to set my aperture to f/2.8 and shutter speeds @ 1/2, 1, 2, 4, 8, 15, 30 seconds. but I have also heard aperture should be at f/8-f/11 with similar shutter speeds...I have also heard to go all the way up to f/22 with shutter speeds up to a minute. Anyone care to offer some advice or help?
Thank you all

 

[thereyougo!]

Is this with 35mm film or 120 roll? Depth of field is different on medium format. It all depends on the effect you want. If you shoot at f/11 you will get sparkle effect on streetlights which some find pleasing, but this will extend the shooting time. Be sure to use a cable release or self timer to reduce camera shake

 

[Derrel]

f/2.8 is ridiculous advice. Smaller apertures will give you better rendering of street lights and other point light sources in close-range shots. One of the The BEST times for city skyline shots is when the skyline itself is visible, which means is not at full darkness, but instead earlier in the evening, during the transitional period from twilight to dark. Look up some of the Kodak articles on the subject using Google.

You need to be very careful when shooting at speeds like 1 second, 1/2 and 1/4 to 1/8 second: at those times, mirror slap and first-curtain slap can cause vibration that lasts for 40 to 75 percent of the time the shutter is open and making the exposure....LONGER speeds, like 5 seconds to 30 seconds make mirror slap, and shutter vibration LESS of an issue than the near-instantaneous times like 1/8 second.

In general, I think f/22 is too small of an aperture for distant skyline type shots....f/8 and f/11 are your go-to apertures. One issue is that film suffers from reciprocity effects, and at f/22, you will be introduced to Mr. Reciprocity much sooner than you would at f/8.

 

[Raian-san]

I would agree to keep your aperture around f/8-f/11. Whoever said f/2.8 must not know what he/she talking about. It's already hard keeping focus of a single person or subject near yet along a whole skyline.

 

[dblb48]

thanks for the advice guys. Intuitively thats what I was thinking, but I'm just a beginner so I don't know for sure.

 

[radiorickm]

I would agree to keep your aperture around f/8-f/11. Whoever said f/2.8 must not know what he/she talking about. It's already hard keeping focus of a single person or subject near yet along a whole skyline.

OK...This is ME getting up on my soapbox about now.............

There should be absolutely NO problem keeping a proper focus or depth of field while shooting night time skyline shots at f2.8.

All of you guys keep saying this, but you are forgetting one important thing.

Aperture is not the ONLY factor in figuring depth of field. Camera to Subject DISTANCE is an equally important factor in the equation. (In addition to focal legnth)

According to the OP, he would be shooting skyline, which indicates to me that he will be focusing near infinity. At that focusing distance, everything from 50 foot to infinity will be in acceptable focus (he didn't say which lens, but I assume 50mm or less).

The super narrow depth of field becomes a concern the more the camera to subject distance is DECREASED. At the close end of the focus range, you will have absolute minimum depth of field.

This doesn't mean I am recommending f2.8, but it is CERTAINLY a usuable aperture. Depending on desire to capture motion, or create blur would be considering factors on whether or not it is appropriate.

 

[Derrel]

Distance between the buildings in the foreground and the actual skyline might be quite large.

Unless you have a super-quality optic, like the new 24mm f/1.4 AF-S G Nikkor, or the 85mm 1.4 AF-S G, or a 58mm f/1.2 Noct-Nikkor, the lens at f/2.8 will be so riddled with coma that every point of light will look like a football...most normal to good lenses are not very well-corrected for coma, and your point light sources at f/2.8 will look like CRAP at f/2.8.


As for "all of you guys saying this", please take note of my EXACT suggestions in my original post. I wrote, "f/2.8 is ridiculous advice. Smaller apertures will give you better rendering of street lights and other point light sources in close-range shots."

The better rendering of street lights that I mentioned will be due to the aberration correction most lenses will exhibit at f/8....my suggestion of using f/8 or smaller had nothing to do with depth of field or focusing. If he wantshazy blobs of light around all street lights at closer ranges, and crappy-looking light sources, then he ought to shoot at f/2.8.

 

[radiorickm]

BTW, I agree with what Darrel says, I was just not ...in total agreement.....(as politically correct as i can make it)..... with Raian-san's reasoning.
(ALL you guys) referred to the quoted reply. Not the other comments......sorry DERREL

 

[Derrel]

Back in the mid-1980's when film was king and I was in college, I spent one entire spring outdoors, roaming around the city at night with a Nikon FE-2 and a camera loaded with either Tri-X or Kodachrome 64, a pair of Vivitar 285 HV flashes, a Quantum battery One and a Quantum Turbo,and a heavy Bogen 3040 crutch-leg tripod. The coolest thing about the Nikon FE-2 was that it would over-extend the specified metering range by a huuuuuuge factor...it would time out exposures of 256 seconds at f/8 at ASA/ISO 64 quite reliably, even though it was spec'd at something like f/1.4 at 8 seconds.

Tri-X at night is a very,very,very good film--better IMHO than T-Max due to the tonality of Tri-X with regard to the way it handles over-exposed highlights AKA street lamps! lol.

As I stated above, reciprocity effects hit film at night time exposure times, pretty seriously. Not sure what kind of light meter the OP has access to, but one thing to remember is that "SOME" light meters will tend to suggest exposures that will make a night scene look like a daytime scene, so, exposure bracketing is often very,very helpful. Because of that, using f/8 at night was almost always my preferred f/stop...f/11 doubles the needed time, f/16 quadruples the time needed, and thus f/11 and f/16 make bracketed exposures a very lengthy, time-consuming way to shoot. I do not recommend f/11 or f/16 unless one wants nice, big, beautiful star effects on light sources, OR when working around brightly-lighted areas like town squares, arenas, commercial districts, lighted fountains, or large, light-colored flood-lighted buildings. "Some" night scenes are very bright...others take 2 minutes at f/8 at ISO 64...it all sort of depends on when, and what light there is on-scene.