Mark Knopfler, pictures and some questions...

Canon EF 17-40mm f/4.0L USM

03/06/2005 09:06:47 AM · #1

Hi,

Just came back from the most amazing night of my life. Went for a concert by Mark Knopfler and really had a blast.( Do understand that here in India we get to see any International Music star only 1-2 times a year. So it is a huge event when someone does come down.). He being my personal favourite it was an exceptional blessing. the only dissappointment was I wasnt allowed to take my camera inside :-(

Nonetheless I did make use of it for night time snaps later. I had a few questions regarding my first outing with my camera.

- Most shots were night shots and I noticed that a lot of them were either overexposed(i.e. too flashy) or underexposed (i.e. the flash didnt light up the subject properly, mostly due to the distance). I wanted to know how to find a good balance without always having to keep adjusting your distance. e.g. in overexposed images are there any fixes one can do in PS?

- This one's silly - now I took close to 120 snaps. All snapshots. All at 4mp and each file will be huge for online use. I have to compress or resample them. I know how to do it individually but is there a s/w which does this in batches of say 20,30 or whatever. Doing them one by one and 120 in number I'll be dead.

- also a few tips on night photography keeping in mind my camera and limitations (its automatic apart from the scene and other modes).

Thanks in advance.

soup

Canon EOS-30D

03/06/2005 09:21:57 AM · #2

not much you can do to properly expose a shot at night with the flash, when the subject is beyond the flashes max distance ( check the manual )

for the over exposed ones, when you are close to the subject - you could try setting a negative exposure compensation to try to tone down the effects of the flash. but it's unlikely it will prduce stellar results.

if you are using photoshop elements - under file/automate there is a batch convert option.

edit; BTW - i am a big fan of dire straights, and mark knopfler. my parents saw dire straights in a bar before they became famous.

try motion effects at night - don't use the flash, but let the motion create surreal results...

Message edited by author 2005-03-06 09:23:37.

03/06/2005 09:43:16 AM · #3

Thanks man. Thats awesome. Seeing them before they became famous. I guess people there have more chance to see these biggies and hence the humility.

Another interesting thing I was trying to do was click a snap in a darkish envioronment without flash. But I couldnt get a crisp result. I was shaking badly when I was snapping.

ok I think I should be more specific, I was travelling in a bus early in the morning. So it was dawn outside and little light. There was a very pretty girl friend of mine sleeping on the next seat and I wanted to click her like that without waking up half the bus and her. So I know I needed faster shutter speed but then the aperture wouldnt be open wide enough. And the shaking bus didnt help matters either. So i tried this trick wherein I focussed outside the window to get a faster shutter speed but invariably the final image would not be blurred but darkish. I tried various different scene settings also and nothing seemed to work better. I know its the limitation of my automatic snapper but does anyone know of any tricks to figure out a way around these limitations?

Canon EF 17-40mm f/4.0L USM

03/06/2005 11:14:58 AM · #4

bump

soup

Canon EOS-30D

03/06/2005 12:44:21 PM · #5

a tripod, setting the camera on something stable ( on a bus this would be difficult ), knowing the limitations of the available light.

the camera is trying to estimate how to expose the photo properly. if there isn't enough light - it's going to set the shutter speed slow, and the aperture as wide open as it can go. if the camera meter still says the photo is going to be under exposed at a shutter speed less than 1/60th, it's likely you'll have a blurry photo. if the subject itself is a moving object you'll need even faster shutter speeds to keep the object form blurring.

if you don't look at how the camera is metering ( and be sure it is in the OK area ) your pictures will likely be sub-par.

LindaLee

Canon EOS-40D

Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM

03/06/2005 12:50:37 PM · #6

Mark Knopfler absolutely rocks, one of my most favorite artists. What a great opportunity for you. Post photos ASAP!!

I am not familiar with your camera, is it a P&S, does it shoot RAW? Also, what software are you currently using to poat-process your photos?