Traffic at night long exposure advice.

[britonk]

I live near to a large road, far enough away so it doesn't keep me awake There is a pedestrian bridge that goes over the road and provides an interesting view.

I think it might look good at night with a long exposure to capture moving traffic. I have never really done this before and whilst I am prepared to do a bit of trial and error is thee any basic advice I should take into consideration before I head down?

Shooting mode? Metering mode? WB?

Any help much appreciated.

 

[Buszaj]

Well, you'll need a tripod firstly. Once you're set up, I'd try closing the aperture down a bit, and have an exposure time of anywhere between 4 and 30 seconds. Experiment with the exposure time and aperture. For focusing, probably just focus on the road/cars.

 

[Coldow91]

I would shot in either manual or shutter priority. I am not sure about white balance (maybe shoot tin RAW) so you can try out different things. I would try a various range of exposures from 5 secs to 30+. A tripod is also a must as said before.

 

[soylentgreen]

Try Aperature mode, ISO 100, I use evalutive metering, AWB, shoot RAW, close the aperature a bit, say f/11-22, mount on tripod, focus, shoot. Should give you a nice 30 decond exposure for nice trailing light shots. Fiddle around and see what works for you.

 

[Sideburns]

Manual.
20-30 seconds..depending on how much traffic..
Close your aperture to f22- f32 somewhere...try them all.
I've done a bunch, and they always turn out neat.

 

[britonk]

Quality - a range of good answers there - thanks folks! I'll try a few out and let you know how I get on

 

[Atreus]

this is my first try.....lol

oh, and my settings. um. fstop at 8.0 with a 20s shutter speed. no tripod! i'm poor. lol. i just placed it on a stable surface and prayed....

 

[Fliphishermon]

nice... some coming at you. what happened to outbound?

I'm going to have to try this. looks like fun...

 

[Atreus]

lol. no traffic going the other way AT ALL. i was miffed about that, lol.

 

[Viperjet]

Make it a little darker.

 

[Atreus]

Like this? (3rd shot)

 

[Robp412]

That looks cool but you should try to get maybe a few cars underneath so they get the blur of them also... Just a suggestion might look cool.

 

[Atreus]

what do you mean? I'll prolly be going out again tonight....

 

[Sideburns]

yes, the second shot is loads better in terms of exposure.

 

[Skyhawk]

Not sure about how you do the long exposure shots digitally, but with film, I set up on a tripod, close the lens down to f16/f22, use a cable release and lock the shutter open and then use a lens cover to keep misc light out until a wave of cars comes along (I take away the lens cap).

Then, after the cars have come/gone, I can either put the lens cap back on and wait for another wave of cars or pedestrian traffic/whatever. It also helps me control the overall exposure.

This technique also works well when you're trying to capture lightning storms.

Jeff