How to shoot handheld nightscapes
Move freely through the city shooting handheld to capture wide and intimate city scenes that are pin-sharp and perfectly exposed.
Night photography has the ability to make the mundane look magnificent, and going out carrying little more than a camera and single lens makes for a liberating shooting experience. Shooting urban night photography handheld allows you to move quickly and easily from one shot to the next; exposure times are short, so no waiting for long exposures to finish and no messing around with a tripod; you can just keep your camera in hand, shoot as soon as you see something of interest and then move on.
The camera settings you’ll need to use are extreme, but modern cameras are
1
SET AUTO ISO With Auto ISO, ISO is constantly adjusted to the lowest possible setting to maintain a fast enough shutter speed to avoid camera shake. Set Auto ISO to a maximum of ISO 6,400 with a minimum shutter speed of 1/60 sec. Set ISO to Auto.
2
SELECT SHOOTING MODE Set your camera to shoot in aperture priority with the aperture at f/2 if shooting APS-C and f/2.8 if full-frame. Depth of field will be shallow, so for intimate scenes focus on the point of interest and for wider shots focus deep into the scene.
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CONTROL EXPOSURE The camera’s metering system will typically overexpose night shots. Dial in one stop of negative exposure compensation – this should ensure correct exposure, but adjust while shooting if needed and set metering mode to Evaluative.
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NIGHT FILTER Several filter companies produce Natural Night/ Neutral Night filters that neutralise the orange glow of street lights. It’s not essential as you can fix colour casts with white balance during editing, but is ideal if you like to get shots perfect in-camera. capable of exceptional image quality at higher ISO settings, so you can still achieve great results above and beyond ISO 1,600. Fast primes such as a 35mm f/1.8 or 50mm f/1.8 will be a huge help because they’re fast and don’t require an exceptionally fast shutter speed to avoid camera shake – sharp shots come down to the combination of exposure settings.
Handheld shooting at night is incredibly easy and the images can look infinitely more interesting than those taken in daylight. So, cast off the shackles of a heavy kit bag and tripod, and enjoy the freedom of shooting illuminated city scenes at night.
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IMAGE STABILISATION If your camera has in-body stabilisation or your lens has optical stabilisation, turn it on. Shooting at 1/60 sec with a fast prime lens such as 35mm or 50mm should be fine, but you could try 1/30 sec with image stabilisation.
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SHOOT MULTIPLE IMAGES When shooting at extreme settings like these it pays to take several shots of the same scene to account for autofocus errors and camera shake. Check images on the camera LCD to ensure one is sharp before moving on.