Weather Related Photography Tips

muckish

This is a thread on tips, specifically for those boards members who love the weather and photography.
It will consist of tips relating to equipment, camera settings, environmental conditions, weather phenomena etc
It's aimed at all photogrpahy; from digital slr, compact point and shoot to mobile phone.

No tip is ridiculous. If you think you have a tip from which others will benefit; post it here.

A few guidelines to adhere to.......
Keep the following format:

---

Tip class: (equipment, camera settings, general photo tip, night time photography etc)

Tip description:

Image:

---

and...

• Let's keep chat to a minimum so that the tips don't get lost in the thread.

• This is not a photo clinic: So don't post a photo to ask how it could be improved or what went wrong with it.

• Post weather photos in the "Weather Pictures" sub-forum as usual

• Don't grab a tip from another website and post it here unless you have tried it out yourself.

• Add an image to explain the tip or show the final result. (might be good to show the EXIF data for final result photos)

Let's see how this evolves.....

muckish

Tip Class: Equipment (tripod)

Tip Description: I have an aluminium Manfrotto tripod that gets very cold when out photographing the night sky etc. So rather than buying expensive sleeves for the legs I wrapped pipe insulation around the legs and gaffer taped them on. Just make sure the insulation isn't too thick so that the tripod legs wont fold back neatly. Makes it easier to carry in the cold but also makes it more comfortable to carry over the shoulder on a walk.

Image:

muckish

Tip Class: Photographing the Northern Lights

Tip Description: With the possibility of a Geomagnetic Storm this weekend here's some tips on capturing the Aurora if it shows.

1: A fast wide angle lens. f4.0 min and 24mm max (a higher focal length lens 35+mm wont capture the expanse of the aurora)

2: As high an ISO on your camera before noise becomes an issue. You'll have to test your camera's performance here and look at the results. I've a Canon 400d which struggles above 800, and a Canon 7d which is brilliant at 1600+

3: High ISO will let you use low shutter speeds @ f1.8 -f4.0. The faster the shutter speed the more of the structure of the aurora you'll capture, Other wise anything above 15 seconds will blur the aurora. Stars begin to trail over 30 seconds.

4: Take an image, review and adjust speed/ISO accordingly to get the right exposure. Review the histogram.

5: Use a tripod or beanbag to keep the camera steady. Use a remote release to avoid camera shake, and set your camera to mirror lockup.

6: Set the white balance to Daylight if you're in a Dark area. Set to Tungsten if there's light pollution. Shooting in RAW will allow you to change these setting in post processing.

7: Set lens to manual focus. Know how to manually focus on infinity. It's difficult to do at night in the dark. A headtorch with redlight can help, or the glow from the screen of a mobile phone. Some lenses have distances scales on them, others don't. Use liveview functions to focus, or take an image, review and adjust focus untill you get it right.

8: Wrap up, stay safe and enjoy the show.

Image:


Canon 400d, f4.0 17-40L @17mm, 30', ISO 800.