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Right metering on night shots?
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Im trying to get a shot and need some advice.
Shot details:
I will be shooting traffic on one of the M50 overpass’es, at night. I want the traffic to be blurred, the road and pavement to be exposed correctly and sharp, and the background ( sky etc) to be the correct shade of really really dark blue, and not black.So, I have a tripod. good start i guess! I will be metering off the nearest thing to neutral grey i know there, the pavement.
The problem is, will metering off the grey pavement leave the street lights overexposed, and the background completely black? I know I will have to get out there and try, but im looking for a bit of heads up advice before going out.
What metering mode ( cannon 400d) should i use? I only ever really use evaluative as its most forgiving. . would center weighted be better in this suituation?
I only use spot metering or a handheld lightmeter at night, find a starting point and continue with trial and error until I get the exposure I want…. if we are talking about digital. If you meter for the darker areas in the frame and underexpose them slightly, you should get a good idea where to go from there.
Fire off a few test shots in manual. Leave your aperture at, say, F5.6 and try 2 seconds, 5 seconds, 10 seconds etc. to get the nearest exposure to what you have in mind. In low light you can get away with a couple of seconds each side without making a huge difference so just experiment, it’s a great way to learn the ins and outs of exposure. I never use any kind of metering after sunset now, you kind of ‘get it’ after a few attempts. Just make sure to be there about 20 mins after sunset, you will then have an hour or so to play with different levels of brightness between the ground and the sky, after about 3/4 hour after sunset you’ll be getting very dark skies if you want detail in the ground too.
thanks folks.
Cian, when you say you never use any kind of metering after sunset, do you mean you just dont worry about what is selected in the camera or have you a camera that you can disable the onboard metering options or what?
Well during winter it can get dark very fast so every few minutes you need to adjust the exposure by a second or two, not so much during summer. As I mentioned though I leave the aperture as it is. After a while you start adjusting it automatically every few minutes until it’s actually dark when the exposure stays pretty much the same. Dont trust the screen on the back though, once it gets darker the exposure will look brighter on the screen than it actually is, turn the brightness of the display all the way down if you want a general idea but trust the histogram instead.
You might find this essay helpful: http://www.petercox.ie/newsletters/jan09-newsletter.php
You won’t have a lot of the difficulties I speak of here because it won’t be that dark, but essentially the meter may or may not function for you. Working in manual, and adjusting the exposure by trial and error is the way to go.
Cheers,
Peter
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