Night shooting question

vulcan57

Just wondering is there a way of avoiding the "flare", for want of a better name, from lights when shooting at night. I've tried different F stops but they still seem to be there. Sometimes they can add to the picture but others they can be a distraction. Was wandering if maybe a polerising filter would be an answer? Don't have one at the moment though to try. The type of thing I am on about is in this picture. The street lights here really are a distraction from the Cathedral.

charybdis

vulcan57 wrote: »

Just wondering is there a way of avoiding the F

Stop at E.

vulcan57

charybdis wrote: »

Stop at E.

Sorry, accidently hit the return key or something when typing this out. Corrected now.

Tea 1000

Does look slightly worse than what I normally get. The lens needs to be super clean. I always have my lenses covered with a filter from new, but I take that off sometimes in order to get a crisper shot. Do you normally have a filter protecting your lens?

gloobag

Lens hood and your smallest aperture. Usually f22.

FoxT

One of the causes of flare is very high contrast in the scene. If you had taken this photo when there was more sunlight, overall contrast would have been reduced & so I would expect that the flare would have been less intrusive.

A Lens hood can help - but would be of limited use in this scene - hoods help if you have very bright light sources off to one side.

Avoid filters. A polariser will not help you at all, and even clear UV filters can promote or exacerbate flare at times.

use a prime instead of a zoom lens. Reason: zooms have more glass elements in them, and therefore more sources of unwanted reflections/flare.


Experiment with aperture...try at both low & high f-stops - the effect will vary significantly & if flare is unavoidable then at least you will have a few different variations to choose from.

Thecageyone

As I just mentioned in another thread with night shots, the lens you're using can change how lights come across in longer exposures.

Here is one from a long while back I took using a bridge cam -

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cagey75/4436100339/in/set-72157623628481448/

I had to bump the black levels a LOT and use adjustment brush set to a lower exposure over lots of flaring, the 'starriness' of the lights was a bit crappy too.

Just for example -


A more recent shot, using my old Sony Dslr + Minolta 50mm prime:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cagey75/4463576086/in/set-72157622618274678/

I find the better the glass the better the starry lights/lack of glare and flare you're likely to get, meaning less post processing and better sharpness all round. Everyone should have a nifty-fifty, I love using them for long exposures.

Freddie59

Here's a few I took last week:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/23296461@N04/

Taken with Canon 40D and an f/2.8 17-55 lens. F/22 and ISO 100 to 200. U/V polariser on lens. No hood.

tommycahir

Freddie59 wrote: »

Here's a few I took last week:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/23296461@N04/

Taken with Canon 40D and an f/2.8 17-55 lens. F/22 and ISO 100 to 200. U/V polariser on lens. No hood.

Some nice shots there, however what difference would a U/V polariser make on nighttime shots with respect to the "glare"??

Freddie59

tommycahir wrote: »

Some nice shots there, however what difference would a U/V polariser make on nighttime shots with respect to the "glare"??

My apologies. I should have said U/V filter.

It lives on the camera!

Just making the point that it was there - that was all.

PCPhoto

a UV Filter - can lead to ghosting...or halo's of light added - due to essentially adding extra layer of glass to the front element.