EXIF: This photo was taken with a Nikon D700 and the superb 14-24mm f/2.8 Nikkor lens in full darkness under a full moon in January 2012 in a junkyard with many cars from the 1940's and 1950's.  The camera is in manual mode with shutter in "bulb" and aperture f/8.  The exposure time is controlled with a programmable remote release but a manual remote release can be used but then you must measure time with a watch or by counting, which I have done many times.  You do not want to hold the shutter release manually as this will undoubtedly ruin the image with motion.  The ISO here is 200 which I believe is the "native" ISO for this Nikon sensor.  The most important piece of equipment for night photography is the tripod which must be very sturdy to avoid motion or vibration.  I use a Gitzo tripod and a Really Right Stuff ballhead.  I like the ballhead because it is easy to adjust to any position desired.  For night photography it is always best to shoot in RAW mode because then you can adjust the white balance to the most suitable range depending on whether there is ambient light, such as incandescent light which will give a yellow cast.  I have shot with film under the full moon but the exposure is much longer due to the reciprocity characteristics of film and you must wait for your film to be developed to see if you have made any mistakes.  Sometimes I set up my film camera and open the shutter and then go and shoot digital images during the 30-45 minute exposures.

One of my favorite photographic activities is night photography under the full moon preferably in junkyards or abandoned places.  This requires identifying such a place and making arrangements for access with the owners.  It is not wise to sneak in as many of these places are protected by a junkyard dog!  Sometimes approaching the owner ahead of time and showing some photos will be helpful.  Offering some money or other things (in this instance a case of beer) can be successful.  You must plan your shooting for the dates of the full moon (an iPhone app can be helpful here) and you need a clear sky.  Actually some scattered clouds with interesting shapes are ideal.  You must then scout the location during the daylight and see how the moon will strike the cars that you wish to photograph.  Look for hazards such as snakes, scorpions, sharp sheet metal, holes.  You must keep in mind where the moon will rise and how it will move across the sky.  You do not want the most interesting portions of the car to be in dark shadow.  In this case the moon is almost exactly overhead as you can discern from the location of the bumper and door shadows.  I had looked at this car earlier in the evening and the shadows were not good.  Because of the relatively long exposures with a digital camera a cool night is best as this reduces the amount of sensor noise in your photos.  You can run the long exposure noise reduction in-camera but this doubles the length of your exposure and reduces your productivity in half.  Each camera has different sensor noise characteristics so it is a good idea to try some long exposures with your camera at different temperatures and see how much noise you see in your images.  Also if you are wanting to "stack" multiple exposures to create long star trails (as in another of my published photos "North") then you cannot run the in-camera noise exposure with the D700.  If you are stacking exposures for star trails then the delay between each exposure can be no more than 1 second or you will see a gap in the stacked images and you must take this into account in the programming of your remote release.

With night photography when you are doing "light painting" during the exposure I find it best to first shoot a picture as the base with no light painting.  This is then used as the background image during later post processing as you can paint out your light painting with layer masks.  However you still must be careful not to burn out all the details with your light painting as this will look unnatural even with your background layer.  There are several ways for determining your basic exposure.  Some people recommend a "high ISO test shot" in which you turn up the ISO to get a shorter test shot.  If you do this you must make sure to get your ratios correct (e.g. a 1 minute exposure at ISO 1000 is equivalent to a 10 minute exposure at ISO 100) and also be sure to set your camera back to the desired ISO before you make your final exposure.  Another quick conversion is that the number of seconds of exposure at ISO 6400 is the same as the number of minutes of exposure at ISO 100 (so a test shot of 6 seconds at ISO 6400 equals an exposure of 6 minutes at ISO 100).  WIth the preset banks on a Canon the ability to change all your settings at once makes is easier (I am told).  If you are shooting under the full moon you will find that your exposure does not change much through the evening and also from one full moon to the next.  The exposure here of 4 minutes at f/8 with ISO 200 is a fairly good starting point for full moon night shooting.

Getting correct focus at night can be tricky because it is dark.  One of the best ways is to find out the hyperfocal distance for your lens.  At this distance everything from half the hyperfocal distance  to infinity is in focus.  There are online depth of field calculators for determining this for your lens as well as iPhone apps which will do this.  Another way of getting focus is to shine a flashlight on your object and then engage the autofocus on your lens and partially depress the shutter release to obtain focus and then turn off the autofocus.  This requires a lens for which it is easy to turn the autofocus off and on.

This photo is made from several exposures.  The first had no light painting.  During the second I used an LED flashlight to throw some light on the drawing on the door as well as on the front grill.  During the third exposure I used a strobe with a green gel and opened the car door and held the strobe under the steering wheel to cast the shadow of the steering wheel on the windshield and triggered the strobe only one time with the manual trigger button.  It is important to crouch down or you will see the photographer during this maneuver.  It takes experience/ trial and error to learn where to place the flash to get the shadow where you want it.  I then used a flashlight with a snoot to light each headlight for a few seconds.  As you are standing in the image while doing this it is nearly impossible to avoid seeing the photographer in the image while doing this but it is easy to paint out the photographer with layer masks during the post processing (this is another good reason for having a background exposure).  Once your exposure is made make sure to check each image on the camera screen to make sure that you did not "overcook" your light painting and burn out all the detail as this cannot be repaired in post processing.  The light painted areas should not be overly bright and there should be preservation of detail.  At first it will take several or many tries to get it right.  Remember that if you are trying to stack star trails then you cannot delay between the exposures.  If you have a complex light painting scheme then you may want to get this correct and then run several exposures afterward (without moving the camera, of course) in order to get your start trails which add detail to the sky.

I chose this composition because I wanted to use the distortion of the ultra wide lens to maximize the front grill but I also wanted to show the windshield and the unusual drawing on the door.  It is often best to shoot cars from a low angle and to make sure that the symmetry is perfect.  In this instance I chose an off center composition to emphasize the door and the prominent shape of the hood of the car. If you look at car photos you will find that most are taken from the exact center of the car or at a 45 degree angle and these are generally good angles to choose but you can try others as well.  The most important thing is if you are trying to shoot from the front make sure that you are lined up perfectly by aligning the rear view mirror with the hood ornament, etc.  Take plenty of time to line up the exposure because if you are off just a bit it becomes very obvious when shooting a symmetrical object with distinctive shapes, such as a car.

Once I get home after a long night in the junkyard (we often shoot until 2 or 3 am) I import the RAW files into Lightroom 3.  I choose to convert them to dng files but also make a backup of the original files out of the camera.  I am using a machine made by HP with an Intel core i5 processor and running Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit.  I select the images that I want to combine and highlight all of the dng files by holding down control while selecting each thumbnail.  Then right click on one of your selected images and on the pop up scroll down to "open as layers in Photoshop" and click on that.  It is possible to apply an import preset to all your images during import but I usually do not other than to add copyright data.  Make sure you do not alter the white balance, etc. on any of your images  in Lightroom before you do your export for image stacking.

All your images will then open as separate layers in Photoshop.  Drag your background image (with no light painting) to the bottom of the stack.  I usually then change the layer blending mode of all the images other than the background image to "lighten" (this is done in the drop down just above the panel showing all your layers and must be done for each layer separately).  This blending mode will show the lightest areas of each image so all your light painting will show up.  On problem that can occur here is that if your camera moved then your entire stack may be rendered useless which is why the tripod is so important.

Now you will likely have an image with too much light painting or some light on the wrong things.  Depending on how many layers there are and the complexity I find it helpful to switch off all the layers except the background (click on the eye next to each layer).  Then starting at the layer just above the background I switch the layer on and see what light painting is in that layer.  I decide what light painting I want to keep in that layer and what I want to remove.  I then add a white layer mask (layer mask reveal all) and then I can use a black brush at about 50% opacity and as soft as possible to brush out the light that I do not want.  I can remove light that is in areas I do not want lit and also reduce light in areas where I want to show shadows.  I can paint out where the photographer can be seen when he is in the frame doing the light painting.  This is then repeated for each light painting layer until you get the image that you envisioned.  At this point I usually save the image back to Lightroom and then in lightroom I crop, straighten, adjust color balance, reduce noise, correct distortion from the lens (in this case I wanted to keep that), adjust saturation, clarity, blacks, etc.  All of these can be done in Photoshop if desired.  Then, depending on the image, I might export a copy back to Photoshop and use a plug-in such as Topaz Adjust 4 to adjust particular areas of the image.  In this image there was also some distracting junk on the ground and I used the content aware delete function in Photoshop to remove it.  Also when light painting the headlights there can be some irregularities in the edges and in the lens so I used some cloning to clean those up a bit. 

I think this image is all about the past--the cars that we drove, what they say about our society, how things have changed and what has become of these old icons.  I want the viewer to stop and think about how technology has evolved and to wonder how many of these cars are sitting in junkyards.  I want the viewer to think about the possible beauty that can be found in things which we think of as garbage.

(1) Think about/ visualize what you want the final image to look like.  What parts do you want to highlight with light painting?  What color palate do you want to use and how will the combination of colors work together?

(2) Think about the direction of your light painting.  Do not light from the camera position as this gives a flat, harsh light similar to on-camera flash.  Light from the sides at an angle to cast interesting shadows which give depth to the image.  Do not move the light excessively as this will spoil your shadows.  However, a little motion of the light is important to avoid a harsh edge from the beam of light.  Small circular rotation of the light source/ flashlight seems best.  Try different types of flashlights:  LED is much cooler than xenon.

(3) Plan your night shooting around the full moon.  Be careful not to overexpose your night shots and lose detail--this is a common mistake.  If there are very bright and very dark areas then you can use these techniques of multiple exposures to create several images that you can blend manually to get the correct exposure in each area, even if you are not doing light painting.

I am a physician/ surgeon in my day job.  I take photos to express my creative side and I like night photography because I like to get outside in the solitude of the junkyard and because I can try the same photo in many different ways.  Mistakes are easily corrected with no dire consequences and "re-dos" are easy.

Thank you for reading and let me know if you have any questions!

Dave Evans

It so happens that i am a physician/surgeon too, based in North India and am taking baby steps in photography. Looking at stunning photographs like this always made me feel envious for i could never, ever, imagine, how such a stunning creation could be made. Thanks a ton to you for such beautiful explanation of this awe-inspiring image and for opening up a so-far vestigeal region of my cerebral cortex. Keep up the good work, it brings joy to many, including me, your newest fan.

Cheers

Detailed but concise and  informative, perfect!