starry said:
hmm how to judge when to shoot? hearing the sound, see the trail go up etc. Most of my shot is either too early or too late. Btw I using only a P&S cos' I new to photography. :embrass: get a lower end one to learn 1st
Hear sound already too late liao lor. Sound travels at 340.29 m/s at sea level, fyi. ;p
It's pretty difficult for a p&s esp if one is not so experienced. You probably would not have bulb mode, but fear not as you can use this method (i have bulb mode but i tend to use this as it automatically closes the shutter, sometimes i forget the timing). Set it to the long shutter method (> 10 s) and you use a black card to block. This way you can even eliminate the shake if you touch the shutter release on the body (coz you don't have cable release, maybe you would have IR remote but that costs $$ so probably not.....i have been on this route before...
). Trigger the shutter open once you "feel" that a pattern has gone past and you wait for the ground to fire again, take away very fast once you see the "muzzle" fire (you should still be able to capture some of the muzzle fire). Once the shells have exploded, wait for the sparkle to die down, often that gives you the nice wispy effect at the end of the trails. If the exposure time is too short, the bloom will look stunted. Block the lens with the card (without touching it of coz) and wait for the shutter to close. You can take away the card again if you want another round of exposure within the same frame. Set the shutter speed accordingly as in longer if you want to have multiple exposures. You should be able to get pretty good shots since you have more control.
Other tips : If your pic has background/foreground objects (most probably buildings), take a few test shots first. For eg, it's around 4s f8 ISO 200 for the singapore skyline from sheares bridge, if you want to take longer it will be 16s f16 ISO 200. This is slightly underexposed as it's better than overexposure, you can PS it later. Your p&s settings will be slightly different as you will use the lowest ISO (maybe 64, 100) and bigger apertures but the concept is still the same.
Careful of firework streaks burn-out due to too big an aperture. Fireworks is metered via ISO and aperture, not shutter speed. Coz fireworks move across the frame (unlike static objects like buildings). You probably will stick to base ISO as that has the lowest noise, so you need to dial in a smaller aperture if you find that it is too bright on the LCD screen. Adjust the shutter speed accordingly if you have buildings in the frame but not too much. There is no recommended settings as the brightness of fireworks also plays a huge part. But basically, a good setting to start with is f16 for ISO 200, f8 for ISO 50. f10 for ISO 100 maybe?
For advanced exposure balancing during long exposures (eg 30s), you need to use the black card method. Fix the aperture, ISO, shutter speed. Get a good exposure of the foreground/background objects eg 15s. In between shots, cover the lens with black card. You need to time it approximately on the actual exposure (time in which the card has moved out of the way). Of coz luck plays a part here too. But i think this is not so relevant for SFF since the firing ground is just concentrated at one spot. During the Esplanade opening, it was WIDE and layered (pyro both on the bridge + seperate firing sites)......you could cramp in a few sets and get an extremely grand picture. Have you seen firework pics of the sydney bridge or at HK? Both wide and layered too. Anyway, not easy to shoot too.
If your p&s has manual focus, use it. Set it to 1 or 2 notches below infinity. Practise during daytime to see what setting is sharp. Set manual WB too, try not to leave it in auto (you can use the test shots)
Having a wide angle adaptor increases your chance too. In 35mm terms, 24mm is about the bare minimum.....unless you are really far away, which is impossible in Singapore because it is so cramped here. 18mm is good. Unless you are going close up on the shots....but usually people's preferences is more on wide. It is ok to take a few shots at 50mm or so, but not too much. It's pretty difficult to setup to zoom on tripod, you don't know where exactly the blooms will appear right?
A good fireworks photog check his site first. A really stupid way to take pictures is being downwind. Not much is mentioned about this, but this is a technique by itself. Then you kick yourself for spending 3 hours chopping place and all your pics sucks. Check the weather service too,
www.nea.gov.sg, under weather link. Plan it before confirming wind direction at the actual location. Do your homework first.
