Photos at Night?

[lfama]

I have a Nikon Coolpix 4100 - it's a 4MP camera w/ the standard zoom. It supposedly has night modes, however, they never seem to work. The only way to take a good night shot where everything isn't blurred is to have one of the photopass photographers take it, it seems! I am hoping that someone here knows about cameras and can tell me if this is with all cameras at night or if my camera is just crappy (it takes great photos otherwise, although it's super slow in between shots unless it's on sports mode.) Is there anything I can do to take better night shots, or should I invest in a fancier camera?

 

[ukcatfan]

I am not familiar with your model, but if it has manual modes, you will get better results using them. It is important to get a longer shutter speed in order to collect enough light. This introduces two potential problems though. With longer shutter speeds, camera shake makes blurry pics. A tripod is needed to correct this. It also helps to set a delay of a couple seconds to prevent shake from pressing the shutter button. Most cameras have this delay feature of between 2-10 seconds. The other problem is that with long shutter speeds anything moving in the image will be blurry. If it is night portraits that you are after, see if your camera has a special mode for it. If not, set the shutter for long enough to properly expose the background, use a flash to properly expose the people, use a tripod, and have the subjects keep from moving until after the shot is complete. People have a tendency to think the shot is over once the flash has gone off, but with a night portrait this will cause a blurry trail. If it does have this mode, it will do these things for you. It might also help to set the ISO to a higher setting, but be aware that this also adds noise.

The best thing to do is play around at home before your vacation and make note of what settings worked the best. When practicing, take it all the way through to how you expect to use the vacation pictures. For example, if you plan on printing the vacation pics, print the tests to make sure they look good. Sometimes images look decent on screen but not when printed.

To get the best night shots, you really need a DSLR with a good lens. They have less noise, so high ISO settings do not ruin the image. In case you do not understand ISO, it is sensitivity. A larger number means that less light is needed to capture the image. But as I said before, it does add noise. On some cameras, the highest ISO makes the image practically unusable. For the lens, a good prime one (i.e. no zoom) with a usable large aperture would probably be the best. If you use too large of an aperture though, the background will go out of focus. This is often desired, but maybe not in a night shot. It comes down to your preference. If you decide to spend the money and go this route, read up on the camera and lens reviews before you buy to make sure you get what you want. Pentax makes a less expensive DSLR that is still very nice, but Canon and Nikon offer fairly inexpensive, but good prime lenses. These are the top three brands for DSLRs in my opinion. I have heard that the ISO noise in Olympus makes it not the best for low light shots. I am not familiar with the new Sony ones, but they look interesting.

Good luck!

Kevin

 

[erinuga]

"A tripod is needed to correct this. It also helps to set a delay of a couple seconds to prevent shake from pressing the shutter button. Most cameras have this delay feature of between 2-10 seconds."

Kevin is right- I have a Coolpix camera and was really frustrated with my night shots- not only did the often come out blurry- they were sometimes grainy. Then, one night I set my camera down on a beach chair (outside of the beach club) and set the self-timer- Voila! one of the best night pictures I've ever taken. So, a tripod, I've found is pretty much essential- which doesn't make it easy to take pictures when you are trekking around the World-- but, if you can find a ledge to rest your camera on and set the timer- you should be able to get some good shots.

Also, have you tried the fireworks setting on the camera? I've found that it works really well...

 

[Master Mason]

They make some very small tripods, which work great for setting up on top of a garbage can. Isn't it nice that disney has all those flat topped garbage cans around everywhere The one I have folds up to be only about 8 inches long.

 

[mabas9395]

Point and Shoot cameras are not really designed for taking stable photos. When you hold the camera out at arms length to look through the LCD, your arms just cannot hold the camera still enough. Good hand holding technique will improve all of your photos, not just the night time ones. Try using the eye piece view finder like we all used to before LCD's (and how we still do it with SLR's), keep your arms close to your body and pay special attention to pressing the shutter button very very gentley.

I use a Canon SLR now, but even when I use my wife's digital P&S, I still take pictures with it right up to my face looking through the viewfinder. It helps me a lot.

 

[lbarnes]

I had fairly good luck by not using my flash for fireworks and SpectroMagic. There are some articles on www.mouseplanet.com by Frank Avanzolini about photography in general, and about night photography in particular.

 

[Groucho]

I'm going to be lazy and cut-n-paste my message from a few days ago when someone was complaining of blurry or noisy pictures from their Canon S3:
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Blurry means that the exposure is too long, and grainy (actually "noisy") means that the ISO is too high. Unfortunately, you're kind of stuck with one or the other.

The aperture makes a difference too, but in this case, that's probably mostly irrelevant, as in anything but full manual mode, the camera will likely already setting it as low as possible in a low-light situation. I assume that you can manually set all three (I'm not familiar with the camera in question, but most any decent camera nowadays can do those).

You can use shutter priority mode and manually select a fast shutter, this will cut down on blurs but up the ISO level, which means more noise.

Or, you can manually set the ISO level, which will force the shutter to slow, which means blurrier pictures.

If there's not enough light to get the ISO level where you want at a shutter speed that is fast enough to prevent blurring (and the aperture is already at its lowest number), then you either have to use the flash or use a tripod and tell the subjects to stand very still.

Unfortunately, good low-light performance is the achille's heel of most any digital camera - no camera can take pictures as easily or cleanly in a dark indoor environment at it can in a bright outdoor environment.
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Then in another thread, I wrote:
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Unless you use a tripod and fiddle with manual settings, you'll still probably be disappointed in the night shots, no matter which camera you get. Point-n-shoot digital cameras just don't play well at night.

That's not to say that some aren't better (or much better) than others - but they all struggle. A DSLR will do quite a bit better due to a much larger image sensor, but it's still no guarantee of great night photos.
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Ignoring aperture (which will likely be about the same either way, especially on a PnS), it's a balancing act between ISO level and shutter speed when you're taking night photos. Fast shutter means high ISO which means noise. Low ISO means slow shutter which means blurring.

Tripods let you use the slower shutter speeds AND the low ISO levels for good-looking night photos, but moving objects will be blurred. Fine for castle photos and often preferred for fireworks photos, but not so good for people or action photos If you want a fast shutter AND low ISO levels, you're getting into DSLR territory, specifically high-speed prime (no zoom) lenses.

 

[Master Mason]

If you want a fast shutter AND low ISO levels, you're getting into DSLR territory, specifically high-speed prime (no zoom) lenses.

Agreed with everything right up to here.... there are zooms out there that are fast.... but they are also expensive. I just got a 70-200 f2.8 that is incredibly fast. But it cost more than the camera itself did too. But man what a nice lens it is I am going to be spoiled now.

 

[Groucho]

Agreed with everything right up to here.... there are zooms out there that are fast.... but they are also expensive. I just got a 70-200 f2.8 that is incredibly fast. But it cost more than the camera itself did too. But man what a nice lens it is I am going to be spoiled now.

Well, I'm thinking REALLY fast. My next lens (hopefully) is going to be the Pentax 50mm 1.4... now THAT is really fast. Supposedly to be astounding quality, too. It can be had for maybe $230 or so (had a $50 rebate but that just ran out.) As you know, getting a zoom that's anything close to that fast requires a significant outlay of cash!

 

[handicap18]

Agreed with everything right up to here.... there are zooms out there that are fast.... but they are also expensive. I just got a 70-200 f2.8 that is incredibly fast. But it cost more than the camera itself did too. But man what a nice lens it is I am going to be spoiled now.

I'd tend to agree more with Groucho. However, it is a bit off topic at least from the P&S stand point. I like the fact that the primes are inexpensive, especially the 50mm f/1.8's. I would absolutly love to have the 70-200 f/2.8 or 80-200 f/2.8 and even the 17-55 f/2.8. But that is a lot of cash for even just one of those lenses. I have the 50mm f/1.8 and am really thinking about getting the Sigma 28mm f/1.8 as well (goes for $250, stupid me forgot to bid on a Sigma 24mm f/1.8 on ebay last month, probably could have gotten if for about $200, it retails for $350! DOH!!).

Another thing I was thinking for those with P&S camera's. How many, if any, P&S camera's have a rear-curtain flash? Are there any? Something like that might help out a bit with having people (at least posing) in low light situations. Any thoughts?