Let Me Blow this Joint Up with the 18-70 Kit - 12 Pix

[ianmiddy]

Definitely prefer the ones with the bridge & tree in - gives a real sense of scale to the [massive] display...

IDM

[Greg Beetham]

Wow! those are good, I can almost hear the pop and crackle....even the colours are great.
Hmm lessee, high ISO that's a given, and lens wide open most likely, but what shutter speed? 1"....2".....3.2"?
Greg

[Dr. Harout]

Excellent shots, I like them all.

[Greg Beetham]

Thanks, guys. If you would like to read the exifs on 120+ of these shots I have up so far from July 4 go here:

http://www.illinoisphoto.com/stock-phot ... ks+photos/

The entire show was shot with the 18-70 kit lens, manually focused in the dark, at f11 and ISO 100. My *target* shutter speed on the majority of the shots was 3.2 seconds, but the full range of speeds I used was from .5 seconds to 6 seconds. The focal lengths on *most* of the shots was between 18-26mm. The small bursts required the longest shutter speeds, for the grand finale I had to cut it down to .5 seconds per exposure. I believe around 4200 shells were launched during the 30 minute sky concert, and the cost of the show was near $70,000.

This was my 6th year shooting this show, and the A700 + 18-70 kit produced more keepers than my Minolta 7hi, Minolta 5D, and the Sony A100 efforts did in the past. My position was sitting on the bank of the river, with my tripod about 2 feet off the ground. I was so close to the river at one point I actually dropped one of my batteries and it slid into the river, luckily I leaned over the bank and retrieved it as it had fallen onto a rock outcropping protruding from the water. This year it was tougher than usual to secure a solid position for the night shoot as the masses had converged on the downtown area for a big outdoor rock concert prior to the show.

-Sonolta

Thanks for the exposure settings Don, we most always have a large fireworks display here on newyears, so next newyear I might actually go down to the Strand and take a few shots...the only problem is the monumental traffic jam afterwards.
It does pay to start brain before engaging mouth, when I saw the ISO 100 and f11 the penny dropped, the fireworks are actually quite bright intrinsically, but I didn't realize they were "that" bright and there is no way I could think of to get an accurate light meter reading, so it would have been a trial and error job for me.
All this has made me realize there is actually one thing that film can do that digital still can't, and that is a "real" in camera double exposure, that would be great for getting a nice cascade of explosions at the "firework" exposure and then doing another exposure over the top at an exposure that would show just a little more detail of the foreground, nothing too overdone though, just a few more building silhouettes etc.
I guess what we can do in digital is just take two seperate shots (on the tripod) and then sort of "merge" them later.....If I knew how that is.
Greg
ps The folks here were quite taken with those shots of yours, while they were on screen I called them in to the room too have a look.

[Dr. Harout]

Thanks to all for looking!

-Sonolta

Thanks to you for always showing us wonderful pictures.

[Vidgamer]

Good shots, Sonolta! Once again, setting the bar high for the rest of us.

Thanks for the exposure settings Don, we most always have a large fireworks display here on newyears, so next newyear I might actually go down to the Strand and take a few shots...the only problem is the monumental traffic jam afterwards.

That's a problem with a lot of events, but seems to be the worst for fireworks shows for some reason!

It does pay to start brain before engaging mouth, when I saw the ISO 100 and f11 the penny dropped, the fireworks are actually quite bright intrinsically, but I didn't realize they were "that" bright and there is no way I could think of to get an accurate light meter reading, so it would have been a trial and error job for me.

I usually do a little trial-and-error at first until it looks right. One thing to keep in mind is to be sure that you are focused on infinity -- review and zoom in once in a while to be sure that everything is sharp. Many (most?) lenses will focus past infinity, so you can't just turn the focus ring until it stops. But yeah, force it to ISO 100, then experiment with aperture and time. F11 makes sense, as the fireworks do get bright. The last time I did fireworks, I had a much more open aperture, which didn't work so well. I'll try to remember to use f11 next time!

All this has made me realize there is actually one thing that film can do that digital still can't, and that is a "real" in camera double exposure, that would be great for getting a nice cascade of explosions at the "firework" exposure and then doing another exposure over the top at an exposure that would show just a little more detail of the foreground, nothing too overdone though, just a few more building silhouettes etc.
I guess what we can do in digital is just take two seperate shots (on the tripod) and then sort of "merge" them later.....If I knew how that is.
...

It's not hard. Load your two photos into your favorite photo editor. Copy one and paste it as a "layer" into the other. Now adjust the sliders to control how much fading of one to the other.... You can do this in lesser-expensive programs like Paint Shop Pro or PhotoShop Elements (or even free photo editors that have layer support). PSP now has HDR support built-in -- it might do this for you.

[Greg Beetham]

You can relax Don, I don't do "cheating"
Greg

[Greg Beetham]

All this has made me realize there is actually one thing that film can do that digital still can't, and that is a "real" in camera double exposure, that would be great for getting a nice cascade of explosions at the "firework" exposure and then doing another exposure over the top at an exposure that would show just a little more detail of the foreground, nothing too overdone though, just a few more building silhouettes etc.
I guess what we can do in digital is just take two seperate shots (on the tripod) and then sort of "merge" them later.....If I knew how that is.
...

It's not hard. Load your two photos into your favorite photo editor. Copy one and paste it as a "layer" into the other. Now adjust the sliders to control how much fading of one to the other.... You can do this in lesser-expensive programs like Paint Shop Pro or PhotoShop Elements (or even free photo editors that have layer support). PSP now has HDR support built-in -- it might do this for you.

I didn't think of it until later, that it would be better too take a few exposures of the general scene first, before any fireworks take place, say, beginning at a half stop up from the "fireworks" exposure spaced about a third stop between from there, and choose the one that looks the best for merging the fireworks onto later...might be worth a try. (at least that would avoid the possibility of having burnout with the colours in the fireworks)
Greg
ps thanks for the tip.