night photography help

[StevePhelps 0]

Okay, I admit, I'm much more of a skydiver who films jumps (affs & tandems) than I am a photographer who skydives. That being said. Any advice on settings for night tandems? See night tandem picture here.

It was a Digital Rebel on "nite auto" ... I think. I like the city lights as they look like weird flames, but my main problem was the camera fired its "strobe?" many times, but only took this one shot. It was on auto focus. Was that the problem? If so, what would have been a good setting?

Also, any ideas about shooting video at night?

[DaGimp 0]

Quote

It was a Digital Rebel on "nite auto" ... I think. I like the city lights as they look like weird flames, but my main problem was the camera fired its "strobe?" many times, but only took this one shot. It was on auto focus. Was that the problem? If so, what would have been a good setting?

for one....that built in flash will give the strobe while trying to ficue, my advice, either get a real flash..440, ,550...or use manual focus

now keep in mind...that i have NEVER dont any night jump filming......so take my advise as needed.

"Professor of Pimpology"~~~Bolas

[vdschoor 0]

Quote

It was a Digital Rebel on "nite auto" ... I think. I like the city lights as they look like weird flames, but my main problem was the camera fired its "strobe?" many times, but only took this one shot. It was on auto focus. Was that the problem? If so, what would have been a good setting?

Also, any ideas about shooting video at night?

I haven't done any night freefall stuff, but this is what I've seen happen on the ground at night (or very low light conditions)
The rebel fires the strobe to help illuminate the subject for the autofocus. Autofocus needs to be able to "see" the subject. If it can't get the focus, it won't fire a shot.

What I would recommend for next time, is to set the focus on the ground, so it's fixed, and then go up on the jump.

Regarding the flash.. I think the on camera flash "will do" as you can see in this shot, since you're going to be very close while filming a tandem.. for anything else, I would start thinking about going to an off camera flash unit like Jake said.

Also I would try to find out what kind of apertures and shutterspeeds the camera picked for these pictures, and set your camera to those next time, instead of shooting in the auto mode..

Nice shot by the way!

[StevePhelps 0]

Quote

Also I would try to find out what kind of apertures and shutterspeeds the camera picked for these pictures, and set your camera to those next time, instead of shooting in the auto mode..

Nice shot by the way!

Thanks. How do I go about finding what the aperture and shutter speeds were on that picture?. I told you I'm no photographer.

[vdschoor 0]

Quote

Quote

Also I would try to find out what kind of apertures and shutterspeeds the camera picked for these pictures, and set your camera to those next time, instead of shooting in the auto mode..

Nice shot by the way!

Thanks. How do I go about finding what the aperture and shutter speeds were on that picture?. I told you I'm no photographer.

It should be in the EXIF information of the picture, which you can read out in Photoshop, or you can just stick the memory card back in the camera and look at it that way. When you hit play to review the pictures it should show you...

Iwan

[DaGimp 0]

Quote

When you hit play to review the pictures it should show you...

in the lower left corner....above where it says what picture number it is (15/35) it will give you another set of numbers #/# which will be the settings that THAT picture was taken on.

"Professor of Pimpology"~~~Bolas

[freefalle 0]

Steve are you shooting with the stock flash? I assume you are. If you are, and you don't have access to a off camera flash, my suggestion is this. use manual focus, I think it will work better in those low light conditions. Secondly, try using a shutter priority of 200 on the TV setting. I think by using an auto setting the camera may be choosing a shutter priority that is too slow for what you are shooting. additionally, I "think" the "strobe" flash does not activate in a manual setting allowing the camera to shoot more shots.. try that and let me know what you think.

[AndyMan 7]

Quote

It should be in the EXIF information of the picture, which you can read out in Photoshop...

You can also easily view the EXIF information in Windows Explorer.

Right click on the file, select "properties". Select the "Summary" tab, and hit the 'Advanced' button. All the EXIF information is displayed.

_Am

__

You put the fun in "funnel" - craichead.

[StevePhelps 0]

Thanks guys! Can't wait for another brave tandem to try a night jump.

[bmcd308 0]

Why 200? The effective shutter speed for the subject is determined by the duration of the flash, which in this case is very very short. 200 might be faster than his camera's max sync speed - typically Canon only gives 1/90 on the Rebel series. If the shutter speed is faster than the max sync speed, there will be an area of the frame at the bottom where the shutter was not open when the flash fired (i.e. a dark band).

A longer shutter speed will give more of those light trails.

The suggestion of going to Manual focus is a good one. The camera will not fire the flash as a focus assist, so you'll have more charge to fire the flash.

You can't do manual flash on any of Canon's built-in flashes, so you'll be using E-TTL.

My advice? f5.6; 1/90; manual focus - focus at about or just short of the distance you think you'll be shooting - evaluative metering. E-TTL will take care of the flash exposure. Try to put your subjects in gray jumpsuits (or at least something the camera thinks is grey).

EDITED to fix spelling and a technical problem.

----------------------------------
www.jumpelvis.com

[velocityphoto 0]

Here's a shot i took with my 550 speedlight Shutter priority 200th of a second on auto . But i recomend shooting it with manual flash on high sync speed 250th of a second . I shot multiple frames on this subject no problems ( manual focus)

A friend will bail you out of jail , a REAL friend will be sitting next to you in the cell slapping your hand saying "DUDE THAT WAS AWSUM " ................