Pierces or anyone... ??? about digital rebel

[cruzegirl]

Ok, here's my issue. I have the Canon Digital SLR Rebel EOS.... I love this camera except for 1 issue... I've had it for 3 years and I have such issues with night shots. Inside, fine.... But anything outside, is a bear. Even with the night setting, sometimes it just doesn't take. I don't know if this is a problem specific to this camera or if it's me or?????? It makes me nuts....My Olympus Stylus 600 that I use for everyday top shots and then use with a housing underwater is sometimes better than the Rebel. I see more definition versus what I get the with Rebel. Here are 2 shots... The first is with the Rebel.

 

And this one is with the little Olympus... Big difference is definition and same shot taken....

 

Do you have any ideas to take better night time shots? I am hoping to take a photography class soon (if I can find one) to better my knowledge but this continues to stump me....

Thanks........

[pierces]

The top shot is simply underexposed.

 

It was taken at 1/25s - f/4.5 - ISO 400 (don't get paranoid...that data is embedded in the image by the camera.;) )

 

The problem is that your camera's meter tries to average out whatever scene you point it at. The moon is very bright and the sky is not. The difference is too much even if you set it on night scene mode. The average of the scene is bright moon with black sky. If you were trying to get details on the moon, you would need to reduce your exposure to almost daylight settings (the moon is in daylight!) f/11 or f16 at 1/125s with ISO 100 would give you good detail like craters and the mares with the sky even blacker. If you wanted the clouds and shadowy trees with the big, brighter moon, you need to adjust away from the average and increase your exposure to, say f/4.5 at 1/2s with ISO 800.

 

This picture was taken at 1/5s at f/2.8 with ISO 800:

 

Taking pictures in difficult lighting requires turning off the "P" mode on the camera and doing a little experimentation. Set your camera on "Av" mode, set the aperture to f/3.5 or f/4.5 and adjust the shutter speed up or down to see what the effect is. You will need a tripod or set the camera on a sturdy table to do most night shots since the shutter speeds can be very long!

 

This was taken at 13s at f/4.0 with ISO 200. The reflection is moonlight:

 

 

Get out the manual, play with the settings and fear not!

 

Happy shooting!

 

Dave

[cruzegirl]

Ok Dave.... Good info..... Thanks...... I will practice on that ....lol....

[GPoll189]

Pierces,

 

I want to thank you and everyone that has welcomed me into this discussion area. I can't wait to start taking pictures on my furture cruises and pictures of things around me. I went out a got myself a book to read, written by Rick Sammon. My next question has to do with some information that I can gather from the pictures that I see on here. How do you get the EXIF information on the pictures posted. Finally what are some places I can go and look at pictures in addition to the ones found in here. Thanks in advance and you know I will have more question soon.

 

Geoffrey

[prophotogirl]

Ya know I love to agree with Dave! :D

 

BTW I have a Digital Rebel (for personal use) and have had it for almost 4 years. I always love to play with the settings.

[pierces]

Pierces,

 

I want to thank you and everyone that has welcomed me into this discussion area. I can't wait to start taking pictures on my furture cruises and pictures of things around me. I went out a got myself a book to read, written by Rick Sammon. My next question has to do with some information that I can gather from the pictures that I see on here. How do you get the EXIF information on the pictures posted. Finally what are some places I can go and look at pictures in addition to the ones found in here. Thanks in advance and you know I will have more question soon.

 

Geoffrey

 

I use PBase to display most of my travel and shared family photos. It is pretty easy to use, but requires some knowledge of computers to use and some HTML programming if you want to go beyond their standard display formats. Part of their standard feature set displays the EXIF basic under the photo and the full EXIF if you click on the option. A lot of what I upload is straight out of camera with re-size only and has the EXIF still embedded.

 

Here is a link to my PBase site (the Travel Gallery link in my signature goes to a sub-folder): http://www.pbase.com/pierce324

 

Check out the sites by Zackiedawg and Photodoodle as well (check their signatures). Good stuff there. Look at sites by Peter Lik, Frans Lanting, Galen Rowell and Michael Melford (I met Michael on a Panama cruise. He was doing a series of lectures as part of Celebrity's Enrichment Series. Very nice man and he gave me a lot of encouragement.)

 

If you want to check out your own picture's EXIF, most of the organizational software you've seen mentioned, like Photoshop Elements, Picasa and others will display EXIF data.

 

If you use XP or Vista, MS PhotoInfo is a freebie utility from Microsoft that puts a "Photo Info" choice on the right-click menu in Explorer that gives you access to just about everything a photo file can contain.

Link: http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/digitalphotography/prophoto/photoinfo.mspx

 

IrfanView is may favorite little viewing utility and it will display full EXIF. It's free too! Link: http://www.irfanview.com/

 

 

The top of my head is empty...;)

 

If you need more, feel free to ask.

 

Dave

[xtopher_66]

How do you get the EXIF information on the pictures posted.

Most photo hosting sites extract the EXIF data from the image when it is uploaded and make it available when you view the image. This link will take you to one of the images in the original post and if you look at the bottom of the page, you'll see a link to display the EXIF data.

 

Finally what are some places I can go and look at pictures in addition to the ones found in here.

Here are a few:

PBase

Smugmug

Flickr

Photobucket

Picasa

WebShots

[randy98mtu]

Like Dave said, you need to take the camera out of auto mode. I did this gallery just playing around with the manual settings on a cheap tripod. Click on the picture to look at the full gallery. And check out the gallery linked in the comment. That guy is a true artist!

 

This was with a Canon 40D, 17-85 IS lens, 3s f/4.5 at 30.0mm iso800

 

I put the camera in M mode, set my aperture wide open and started metering until I got 0 and then I used the 2 second timer to take the picture. You can see where I played with several settings just to see what they do. I'm still not 100% happy with the results, but my tripod had an untimely death and I'm hoping for a new one for Christmas to make some more trials.

 

Pbase is an amazing place to learn about photography. I spend most of my lunches at work looking at pictures on pbase.

 

I took this one last week in Mackinaw City, Michigan. Without my tripod, I had to set the camera on a table and wedge my finger under the lens to aim it. lol