A few nights ago I had a session in Prospect Park overlooking Providence. After night fell, I hung around a little bit to get some night shots. With 2 little kids, it is a luxury to be able to stand still long enough to use longer exposures. I had no tripod with me, these are all hand held. These are all at 1/6th of a second at 2.8 using 200 ISO. I have found that this is the slowest speed at which I can hand hold a camera. When using longer exposures it helps to brace yourself to steady the camera so that there is less shake. Standing against a tree, resting the camera on a bench or branch are ways to reduce camera shake. I once saw a guy make a tripod by bracing his left hand on his right shoulder and resting his camera on top. It looks ridiculous but works pretty well in a pinch.
Although these are not print worthy, the effect is good enough to capture the beautiful night sky over the city lights.

Tags: long exposures, night photography, providence

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 5th, 2009 at 2:25 pm and is filed under Photography. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.