olympus C-750: help! how to get good nighttime shots!??

[suzimar57]

i've had this camera for 3 years now, and have yet to get a good nighttime shot of the castle, or the view of the MK from our CR tower room, or fireworks, or Spaceship Earth, or, really, ANYTHING at night!

the instruction book is basically useless - the camera doesn't have a lot of settings to choose from

tried using a tripod with a slow setting manually - nothing

all pictures have come out "blurry" and looking like they've been "shaken"

help! i'm sure it's capable of taking good night shots - there's even a night shot mode, but after 3 years of trying different things, i'm ready to buy a new camera

anyone familiar with this one? i'm open to suggestions!

thank you!

 

[momsgoofy]

Okay...will give it a shot...I actually have the Olympus C740..so the models should be pretty close...yours is just the newer one I'm guessing.

I agree with all of your comments...manual book? Ha! It's a joke! There are so many blasted settings and configurations that I still haven't figured them out and I've owned mine since December 2002...I'm thinking if I push the right combination of buttons I'll find a kitchen sink...lol

I have a bad time with the "shake thing", but for fireworks and night parades I have found success when I use the night setting...the one with the crescent moon and star...have the flash on...camera decides to use it or not...and a mini tripod (about 7 inches and the legs are flexible...cost about $10 -$15, purchased at a local camera shop). Granted, every shot isn't great, but I have enough memory cards that using the maximum best settings I get about 300 shots on a 256mb card. For daytime shots, I use the auto setting and let the camera do it's thing with good results or the setting that looks like a runner on the dial...can't remember what it's really called, but it's for fast motion. The tripod helps in most cases as long as it's set up on a well balanced surface and you use a steady hand to press the button to take the shot...not quick and jerky motion.

What I did for the fireworks shots last Christmas was...found an open spot between Casey's and Crystal Palace were the wrought iron fence is kinda clear facing the castle. I attached the tripod and flexed the legs so they wrapped around the top of the wrought iron fence and I held it tight with my left hand...quite steady. Then I used my right hand to snap the shots. Because I have several memory cards (total capacity is about 700 shots) I just kept shooting and got some pretty good ones.

Here is one I shot of the Holiday Wishes in December...

And here are a few from our recent DL trip...Genie from the Aladdin show taken from the nose bleed section (hand held so a bit fuzzy)

Electric Parade (sat the tripod on a garbage can)

a shot of DCA's park taken from the Paradise Pier section (camera balanced on railing around the lake)

I don't know if this will help...hope so...but I think the best advice is to just practice...take as many shots as you can and then see what you have. I typically take 600 shots on a week long trip and only about 200 are saved. Because I don't take a laptop with me I wait till I get home and load them onto my computer and decide which to keep. I don't know if there might be a community college or similar, but ours offers a continuing education course on digital photography. If not even taking a film photography class can help because the basics are the same...just need to have a film camera for the class.

Best wishes for some great shots with your camera! (It took me a few years to really start liking mine.)

 

[peemagg]

My suggestions would be A: a tripod and B: a cord that hooks to the camera and allows you to step away from it and still snap the picture. This way there is not the problem of an unsteady hand when snapping the shot. I think that you will find that that is what pros do quite often in scenarios like this.

 

[suzimar57]

thank you both for responding - sorry i just got around to checking, i thought no one had read my post!

i am bringing a mini, flexible tripod, as well as the remote - figure using them both should finally produce something salvageable (while using the nighttime setting)

we have a MK view tower room at the CR this trip - hope to get some get shots this time from our balcony of the fireworks!

thanks again!

 

[momsgoofy]

Sounds like it should be a great opportunity for some awesome shots! Do post when you get back!