Night Time Photography

Over Christmas and New Year, I was away at Balloch and I spent some of the time learning a bit more about my camera and how the different settings interact. I had such fun doing this and on some of the evenings I experimented with night photography - here are some of my favourite night pictures that I have taken straight from my camera*.  

Trees at night with a long exposure, large aperture,
relatively high ISO and a flash.

Mountains with clouds at Balloch.
A long exposure with high ISO and large aperture.

Balloch mountains at night, with fast moving clouds.A long exposure with high ISO and large aperture.

Balloch Cave at night.
A long-ish exposure, large aperture and relatively large ISO.

Camping at Balloch, with the tent lit up at night.A long exposure with high ISO and large aperture.

The moon in fast moving clouds.A long-ish exposure with high ISO and large aperture.

The night sky surrounded by rocks and trees with fast moving clouds going past it.A long exposure with high ISO and large aperture.

The one thing I learnt while playing around with night time photography is the importance of your ISO setting. This number should be quite high in order for your sensor to sense as much light as possible. 

Don't forget that a high ISO setting can lead to grainy pictures, so play around with various settings in the high range. When combined with long exposures (anything from 10 - 30 seconds) and a large aperture, again to allow for maximum light collection, you should be able to take some pretty decent pictures at night. Finally, make sure you use a tripod or put your camera down where it won't wobble, otherwise your pictures will come out blurry.

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* I'm learning about GIMP as I go along and once I've done some editing I'll display some more pics, with edits.