NIGHT PHOTOGRAPHY
KEEP IT SIMPLE. Star trails are complicated, rather start with something simpler. Look at Stefan’s striking picture above. The spotlight was so bright that a tripod (usually a staple of night photos) was unnecessary.
By using a high ISO of 1 250 (which increases sensor sensitivity) and a super wide aperture of f2.8, he was able to use a shutter speed of 1/640 of a second – fast, for a night shot. When using a light, be careful not to agitate the animal. If it seems uncomfortable, switch off the light.
CAMPING GLORY. On a camping holiday, you’ll spend many nights staring at a fire. Once you’ve had your turn peeling potatoes, use the time to set up a cool campfire scene. Use a tripod and take the photo not too long after sunset – that way there will still be a nice blue or smoky orange hue in the sky, adding some zest to your pic. SHOOT FOR THE STARS. Once everyone has gone to bed, walk away from the camp and set up for a shot of the night sky.
Even with basic gear, you can create something special. Choose a site where light pollution is low, like a guest farm in the Karoo.
EBEN OLIVIER
Canon EOS 5D Mark IV • Canon 14 mm lens • IG: @eben.olivier
EBEN WRITES: I took this photo in the Little Karoo, on a farm called Paardebond about 50 km southwest of Oudtshoorn. It was already dusk by the time I lit the fire. It was cloudless and still – a perfect night. I had my camera on a tripod and my settings were: shutter speed 25 seconds; aperture f2.8; ISO 200. I focused the lens manually and made sure I got the camping chair sharp. After that, I set the self-timer to 10 seconds, which gave me enough time to rush over to the chair, settle down and stay as still as possible during the exposure.
TOAST SAYS: I love it! This is a great scene to photograph, achievable
using most D-SLR cameras without any specialised gear or extensive editing afterwards. You can get this result in-camera, no problem.
If you have friends with you, ask them to walk around with their headlamps on during the exposure – you’ll get cool light trails zig-zagging about. But it looks like Eben was going solo, so he had to pose in his own photo. Any go! journalist is an old hand at this sort of thing: We usually travel alone, too, and then we have to be our own “models” since there’s no one else around to pose around the campfire.
Most cameras have a self-timer you can set to 5 or 10 seconds. You can also set it to take, for example, 5 consecutive shots 3 seconds apart. This gives you time to adjust your pose, and it means you don’t have to run hither and thither between the camera and your chair all evening! Why did Eben use manual focus? Auto focus can struggle at night, and because it “hunts” for a focal point each time you halfpress the shutter button, the focus can jump from where you want it (the chair, in Eben’s case) to where you don’t want it, like the fire – or worse, somewhere random in the background. Switch to manual focus and make sure your focus point is where you want it.
Eben’s wide-angle lens still gave a decent depth of field, even though the aperture was f2.8. To minimise the risk of having a slightly out-offocus photo, rather use a narrower aperture like f5.6 or f8. A narrower aperture will better accommodate a minor focus error and give you a better chance at a sharp shot.
To use a narrower aperture and retain the same shutter speed (25 seconds in this case), Eben would have had to increase the ISO to 800 or even 1 600. This would have ensured he got a similar exposure. In terms of composition, it was important that Eben took the photo before the sky was pitch black. That glow of dusky dark blue allows us to see the horizon, which in turn gives the scene some depth. Neat!
MELANIE MASKE
Nikon D750 • Sigma 12 – 24 mm lens • IG: @africanmamaske
MELANIE WRITES: I went on an amazing two-day boat safari with Caprivi Houseboat Safaris, on the Zambezi River downstream from Katima Mulilo in Namibia. We cruised on the river by day and camped on islands at night. I felt so free and close to nature.
This photo encapsulates that time for me – just sitting around the fire, quiet, hypnotised by the flames and the silence of the night. No words needed.
I put my camera on a tripod and used the self-timer to avoid camera shake. My settings were: shutter speed 1/60 second; aperture f4.5; ISO 1 250.
I didn’t use a flash; I prefer natural lighting. The spark trails were caused by someone moving a log in the fire – it makes for a cool effect in a campfire photo.
TOAST SAYS: Compare Melanie’s photo with Eben’s on the previous page – they achieved something similar despite using very different settings. Ask everyone to huddle closer when you take a photo like this, and to keep their faces turned to the fire. And to stay still! It’s easy to “lose” a face in the background otherwise.
Melanie’s shutter speed of 1/60 second is much faster than Eben’s 25-second exposure. In photography, there are often two or three ways to take a photo, each of which will achieve a similar result.
By increasing the ISO to 1 250, Melanie made the camera sensor more sensitive to light, and it could therefore accommodate the relatively fast shutter speed.
ANDRÉ NEL
Canon EOS 7D Mark II • Sigma 16 – 300 mm lens
ANDRÉ WRITES: I took this photo at Senyati Safari Camp near Kasane in Botswana. I was travelling with my wife Marieta and some other family members and we stayed there for five nights. The waterhole at Senyati has a ground-level photographic hide, where you can watch the elephants up close. The evening I took this photo, however, we were sitting on the deck at the restaurant. A storm was coming in and I set up my tripod and started playing with my cable release. Soon some elephants came to drink. I took 128 photos and captured lightning in five of them.
TOAST SAYS: Awesome! You need a bit of luck when it comes to lightning shots, but it sure helps if you have a few elephants and impressive trees to jazz up the frame.
A landscape photo with lightning always works best if there’s a prominent feature in the foreground, especially at night. Something like a house, a windmill or a tree will do the trick. The floodlights at the lodge light up Senyati’s waterhole. Without this artificial light source, the trees would have been silhouetted (nothing wrong with that) and the elephants would probably have been invisible because they’re standing below the horizon line. I quite like the slightly surreal colour combination caused by the yellow lodge lights and the bluish-white light in the clouds.