NYE Fireworks 2017/2018

[biggerry]

I know ya'all love firework pictures here Happy new year and all that stuff..


(C) 2018 Gerard Blacklock, all rights reserved by Gerard Blacklock, on Flickr

(C) 2018 Gerard Blacklock, all rights reserved by Gerard Blacklock, on Flickr

(C) 2018 Gerard Blacklock, all rights reserved by Gerard Blacklock, on Flickr

(C) 2018 Gerard Blacklock, all rights reserved by Gerard Blacklock, on Flickr


just a last one to detox from fireworks...

2018 in full swing by Gerard Blacklock, on Flickr

[ozimax]

Nice Gerry. I don't know how you do it, but you do it. Must be something to do with a camera or similar...

Superb.

[biggerry]

Nice Gerry. I don't know how you do it, but you do it. Must be something to do with a camera or similar...
Superb.

most of it is about just getting out there to a half decent spot, the rest is fairly elementary..

heres some notes I wrote about capturing fireworks.. (i''ll see ya there next year ozi)

A few key things:
- tripod, yep thats pretty obvious.. but make sure its on something sturdy, sadly alot of my shots have wavey fireworks due to the camera/lens shake which was due to the place where I set the tripod, it had a bit of vibration and when your shooting a long way away a small amount of vibration can impact badly.
- set focus to manual and focus before the show starts.
- use a remote, either the infra-red button or a cable one, as long as it opens and closes the shutter thats all that is needed.
- if you have VR / OS image stabilisation on your lens, turn it off... gets me every time

Camera settings:
Manual mode with shutter set to bulb (basically one press of the remote opens the shutter and the subsequent press closes the shutter.)
Aperture is typically f8-f14, a safe place to start is f10
Shutter speed, this is the only variable you need to control, typically most shots will be from 1 second up to 4 or 5 seconds depending on the firework display.
The shutter speed is very dependent on the fireworks and you have to watch the fireworks to see what colour/brightness they are and adjust this shutter speed as needed. Basically there is a lot of 'chimping' (set your display to show blinking highlights) and adjusting the shutter appropriately.
As a general rule always expose so that the fireworks are not 'blown out' as much as possible, once you over expose the fireworks the colour of the fireworks is gone. I typically under expose to retain the colours.
ie. for the blue fireworks, these can handle a longer shutter speed than most and hence you can get some lovely trails with these and maintain that awesome colour. Typically you can get a 3 or 4 second exposure on these.
green and white colours tend to over expose easily so anything from 1 second to 2 or 3 seconds seems to work ok.
Red fireworks typically are very bright, most of mine are from 1-2 seconds for these.
There is also a technique called 'Black Card' where you can open the shutter for 30 seconds or so and place a black card in front of the lens when there are no fireworks or very bright ones.. kinda like manually controlling the shutter outside the lens I have had mixed success with this and I typically opt for blending individual shorter shutter speed frames as needed. Blending is easy now in PS, simply use the 'lighten' mode on the multiple layers that you have.
HTH.