The first thing every photography instructor tells their students when they introduce the topic of low-light photography is to always use a tripod and then they take a long time to get around to what to do when you can’t use a tripod. Tripods take time to set up properly, not to mention space to set them up in. You don’t always have the room, like when shooting in crowded areas like amusement parks, or the time, when shooting fast paced action. So what to do? We’ll get to that shortly.
Camera optics have come about as far as they can and are as good as they will get, but digital cameras face three challenges when it comes to low-light photography: 1) low-light autofocus, 2) low-light action, and 3) low-light indoors.
Autofocus Lock
Many digital cameras have difficulty achieving focus lock in low light. More and more cameras are being designed and manufactured with low-light autofocus assist devices but some of these devices are better than others at doing the job they were designed to do. An autofocus assist device is nothing more than a built-in light, and the range at which these devices are effective varies from camera to camera–so read up on it in your camera manual. When reading your camera’s manual, keep an eye out for phrases like "AF hunts quite a bit in low-light" or "AF cannot lock focus in low-light." Personally, I never use autofocus in low-light shoots. I switch autofocus off and manually focus every shot. Whenever possible, when shooting action, I try to anticipate where the action will happen and then pre-focus on that spot.
Low-Light Action
To stop action, one has to use a fast-enough shutter speed, and this can become a challenge when shooting in low-light situations. Depending on the kind of action involved, the required shutter-speed to freeze it can be as low as 1/60th second to as high as 1/1000th second or higher. Shooting at less than 1/60th second while hand-holding a camera is to invite "camera shake" and blurred pictures. In order to achieve the shutter speed required in low light you will need to expose using a high ISO setting. Start out by dialing in an ISO of 800 or 1000 and then working upwards from there as needed. Just keep in mind that the higher the ISO at which you shoot, the more electronic "noise" there will be present in your pictures. If you come from a film background, you will remember that the higher-speed films were always more grainy than lower-speed films. With digital cameras, ISO settings control how sensitive the CCD (Close Coupled Device), the camera’s image sensor, is to light.
Shutter Speed Vs Aperture
This is important: if you’re shooting with your camera set to Shutter Priority Mode, the camera will select an aperture appropriate for the shutter speed you elect to shoot with. Keep in mind that if you elect to shoot at 1/500th second the camera will open the lens up to twice that of what it would have if you had elected to shoot at 1/250th second. What this means is that the depth of field will be reduced as the lens aperture opens–and that means focus becomes critical. If you shoot at a higher ISO, the lens will stop down further for any given shutter speed, and the depth of field increases, making focus less critical. Therefore, what you are looking at here is a trade-off between “noise” and “depth of field.” If you don’t mind doing noise reduction during postproduction, opt to shoot at a higher ISO. Whatever you do, you don’t ever want to shoot with the camera set to one of the full auto modes, because the camera will stop down to get the right exposure while dropping the shutter speed and that means that you will be in serious trouble when shooting action.
Outdoors Low-Light, Non-action
When shooting outdoors in low light you can choose to shoot at a lower ISO to increase the picture quality–but if you do, be prepared to handle shooting at slower shutter speed and the ensuing problem of holding the camera steady for the longer exposures. As I stated above, it’s not a good idea to try to hand- hold the camera when shooting at less than 1/60th second. Actually, if you have a tremor of any kind, it’s not a good idea to hand-hold at anything less than 1/125th second. If you can’t use a tripod, use a monopod. Monopods are cheap, easy to carry, and can be used in almost any situation. Use things like trees, poles, fences, roof of cars, etc to steady your camera for a longer exposure.
Indoor Low-Light Photography
There are times when shooting indoors that you can’t use flash; photographing paintings is one of those times, so you need to apply everything I said about shooting outdoors low-light, non-action pictures.
Metering Modes
If you are shooting low-light portraits, pictures of people, or close-ups of any kind, use the “spot metering mode” on your camera. If you are shooting action shots, group shots, amusement park games and rides, etc., switch to “center weighted Mode.” "Matrix Mode” shouldn’t be used in low-light situations. Whenever possible, bracket your exposures by ± 2EV. This will allow you to choose the best shot to work with in postproduction.
White Balance
When shooting outdoors at night, you will encounter many different light sources and their unique color temperatures, and you need to adjust your White Balance settings accordingly. Tungsten light bulbs, Sodium-Vapor light bulbs, Quartz-Halogen light bulbs, fluorescent light bulbs, moonlight, starlight, and a combination of all these light sources are lighting situations that you will encounter at one time or another. If you are shooting at an amusement park you will most likely encounter ALL these light sources at the same time, and your best choice is to set the White Balance controls to Automatic White Balance and let the camera find a happy medium color temperature to shoot at. If you are shooting where the light source is predominantly of one type or another use the WB (White Balance) Custom option to dial in the color temperature for that light source.
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Sodium Vapor Lights
Sodium vapor lights, the most common streetlights, are yellow to our eyes, and orange on photographs. Use the light bulb white balance icon, or a custom or preset white balance setting.
Mercury Vapor Lights
Mercury vapor lights appear blue to our eyes, and green on photographs. There’s no appropriate white balance icon for mercury vapor lights. You can use a custom or preset white balance setting.
Mixed Light Sources
If the scene has different-colored light sources, set the white balance to match the color of the predominate light source. If the light sources are contributing equally, use a custom or preset white balance setting.
Moonlight
Contrary to what you see in films, moonlight isn’t blue. It’s sunlight reflected off the moon. So, use the sun white balance icon.
This is just an introduction to low-light photography, I will cover specific situations in future articles, but this will get you started on the right foot.
