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Night Shots

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richa2002

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I think night shots bring a whole new dimension into railway photography. Let's see your best night shots then! Here are my favourite ones:



 
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Coxster

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Nice pics of Kidderminster, Richard! Are they this weekend's SVR diesel gala?
 

andrewmay

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I know what you mean about night shots. I really like them if I can hold the camera steady. I do have some favorites but they're not online at the moment. Excellent photos by the way.

Cheers,
Andrew
 

Craig

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Nice shots. The last one would probably benefit from having the colours edited to remove some of the yellow from the lights.
 

Max

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Some lovely shots there. My camera hates the dark, so saldy I struggle to get any decent night shots. Even Hull station is too dark, though the new roof should fix that ;)
 

AJP

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Love the second picture, my camara i s rubbish at taking pictures in the dark or is this my fault??
 

yorkie

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Taking night shots:

Basically, you need to increase the exposure time.

Ideally, you want a small aperture (e.g. f/10, or the smallest it will go) for great depth of field, a low ISO level (e.g. ISO 100) to avoid noise, and a very long exposure time (possibly up to 15 seconds if posible). Adjust these settings to match the light conditions to get a good result, it's worth taking a few pics to pick the best later on.

Unfortunately my camera will only go up to 3 seconds, so I have to compensate by increasing the ISO level and increasing the aperture size (to something like f/5 or whatever it takes), this means the results aren't so great, but it's better than having really dark photos. My camera isn't designed for night shots so I am limited with what I can achieve.

If you don't have a tripod, don't try to hold the camera steady as you'll never keep it steady enough. You'll need to lean the camera on something. I can usually find something like a bench, a pole, anything really!

AJP/Laverack222/anyone else having problems, next time you're on a meet in the dark feel free to ask me for advice. I'm not the greatest expert though, but I'll do my best. It helps if you have your manual handy (if you've lost it, you should be able to download it from the web).
 

yorkie

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AJP said:
Love the second picture, my camara i s rubbish at taking pictures in the dark or is this my fault??
I looked at your EXIF data, and it only says "OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA " for the model, so I'd need to know the model number, which I can then use to download the manual and I'll see what settings it can achieve if you like?
 

AJP

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yorkie said:
AJP said:
Love the second picture, my camara i s rubbish at taking pictures in the dark or is this my fault??
I looked at your EXIF data, and it only says "OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA " for the model, so I'd need to know the model number, which I can then use to download the manual and I'll see what settings it can achieve if you like?

Ive got an Olympus Camedia C-370
 

yorkie

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AJP said:
Ive got an Olympus Camedia C-370
Unfortunately the slowest shutter speed is 2 seconds, which is only available in 'Night mode'.

Have you been using night mode to get shots in the dark? If not, you're only limited to a max exposure time of 1 second.
 

yorkie

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AJP said:
Ive not been using night mode because its just bright lights every were :(
Perhaps the ISO setting was too high and/or the aperture too large? Try ISO 100 and a smaller aperture (larger f/number). :?:
 

yorkie

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Richard Armstrong said:
Got this one last night. ISO 100, 1/18 Shutter & F2.8.
1.8 sec not 1/18 sec ;)

are those tungsten lights? could you try that pic with white balance set to tungsten for comparison?
 

richa2002

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Thanks yorkie. Can't believe I missed it considering I corrected it with you once! Will try and edit the white balance.
 
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