Photography Masterclass Magazine
HOW TO SHOOT CREATIVE TRAFFIC LIGHT TRAILS
Photographing traffic probably isn’t something that springs to mind when trying to think of creative photographic situations! But the light trails car lights produce at night can produce fantastic images and help you to experiment with long exposures and manual mode. In this masterclass I’ll teach you all about how to photograph traffic light trails, the equipment you’ll need and great locations to try out. Let’s get started.
EQUIPMENT
Whatever camera you’re using, it will need to be one that allows you to use manual mode. You need to be able to use a long exposure and set your shutter speed accordingly. You can use absolutely any lens for light trails but different focal lengths work well for different shots.
A wide-angle lens is great for shooting from a high vantage point or getting tall buildings into your photograph. But a telephoto lens is particularly good for traffic light trails when you’re looking down a road as you’ll see the individual trails all the way down the road.
It’s not absolutely essential but I would recommend using a lens hood as there will be a lot of light around in your trails and surrounding buildings that could cause flare.
A tripod is absolutely essential for photographing traffic light trails, as they can’t be done with anything other than long exposures. You’ll also ideally need a remote shutter to avoid camera shake (you can use the self-timer on the camera but be careful when you depress the shutter or use shutter delay if your camera hs).
It’s also useful to have a light ND filter in your bag (an ND2 or 4) in case you want to use longer exposures and get longer trails without the image becoming overexposed. Do note, you’ll only be able to use ND filters when it’s completely dark, not at dusk.
CAMERA SETTINGS
Make sure you shoot in RAW so that you’ve got as many potentials as possible in post production. This is particularly important for getting white balance right as you’re likely to have a lot of artificial light causing different colour casts in your image. Shooting RAW gives you more options to deal with this.
It’s also a good idea to keep an eye on your histogram to prevent any light source overriding your image. Blown out areas where there is overexposure can distract your viewer from the focal point of the shot, so you need to check for this. Overexposed areas will show on the right hand side of the histogram, with the line being too high at this point.
If you're not sure how to use your histogram to get a perfect exposure then check out our full article here on Understanding and Using Your Histogram.
Always shoot at the lowest possible ISO for your camera (usually 100 or 200) to give you as little noise as possible. There are no exact combinations of aperture and shutter speed that will work in every situation as the ambient light and speed of the cars is going to vary from shot to shot. I would start with an aperture of f8 (in the mid-range) and a shutter speed of 15 seconds. You can open up the aperture if you want a smaller depth of field and close it down if you want a large depth of field with the whole shot in focus.
Remember that if you use a larger depth of field, you’ll be letting less light in through the iris of your lens so you’ll need a longer shutter speed (and vice versa if you’re using a smaller depth of field).
As a side note – if you’re shooting with an Olympus mirrorless camera, there’s a function called Live Composite that helps with light trail photography. You set the exposure for an initial shot but then keep the shutter open – thus allowing the camera to add in more light as it sees it. The electronics in the camera will stop the highlights being clipped. It’s an extremely clever feature which I’d love to see included on more mirrorless cameras. You may also find that your camera struggles to focus in low light so consider using manual focus to avoid your lens going in and out of focus while you’re trying to set up each shot.
LOCATIONS FOR LIGHT TRAILS
Wherever you’re shooting, you need to guarantee that you’ll have a steady flow of traffic. A busy location with a decent flow of night time traffic will give you the best opportunities for light trails. One of the easiest locations to start out with is a bridge or a tunnel. This means you’ll get plenty of flowing traffic passing by, with a great high vantage to look down onto it. Do bear in mind that you may get a little vibration from passing traffic.
In a similar vein long, straight avenues will also provide ideal locations for light trails – particularly as you’ll see the trails disappearing into the distance. Or, if you live near busy railway lines or airports, you can utilise these too.
Finally, another great location is a road that winds up the side of a hill or has sweeping curves that you can photograph from a high vantage point. This will give a very dramatic and stylised final image.
SHOOTING TIPS
You need to learn to visualise your images with the light trails in place so that you can compose your image around them. The key is to use your traffic light trails as leading lines. They will draw your viewer into the image and allow you to direct the way in which the shot is seen.
You can use some of the normal rules of composition for light trail photography. The Rule of Thirds works well here, allowing you to keep your image balanced and the trails in the centre of your shot.
Make sure that any foregrounds and backgrounds add to your image and don’t distract the eye from your light trails. And don’t be afraid to try different perspectives for your light trail shots. As already mentioned, photographing from a higher perspective can give you a feeling of the lights disappearing endlessly into the distance. Or you could try a low perspective to make your light trails appear bigger and more dominating within the image.
TIMING
Night time is the obvious time of day to photograph light trails as it’s pitch black and the trails will stand out beautifully against the dark bluey-black sky.
However, it’s also effective to photograph light trails at dusk as the sun is setting. The ambient light that’s left in the sky can add atmosphere and depth to your shot. Obviously around rush hour is the easiest time to guarantee a good, steady stream of traffic but different times of year will give you the chance to experiment with different background light.
IN CONCLUSION
Traffic light trails are fairly simple to photograph and you don’t need masses of expensive equipment to achieve creative results. Transport of one description or another exists almost everywhere in the world, but if you’re really struggling remember that you can always create your own light trails by setting up at least a 10 second self-timer on your camera and then driving your own car round in front of the camera!