Sunday, August 31, 2008

A Fireworks Moment


Capturing Fireworks has always been fun for me. When I started out I would try and hand hold the camera with a three second exposure and I would get a blurry mess. Still I was amazed at how the light etched the darkness. Needless to say I have shot many fireworks since then and I found some techniques that work for me. I don't just shoot the sky anymore, I try and get some reference points in the photo. On the bottom of this photo you can see other enjoying the show with me.

One thing that hasn't changed for me over the years is the excitement of fireworks. I still love the larger then life booms and the bright colorful lights. I still get excited waiting for the show to happen. I love being as close as I can get so I can feel the show as well as see it. It is a great moment to sit back and enjoy.

Last night at Anderson Explodes, (Anderson had to postpone their fireworks because of the historic wild land fires that we experienced in July) Annie (my daughter) and Robby (my son) went down to watch. They had the same anticipation that I did and they were totally in the moment with me. We were not disappointed. The show was great and the traffic wasn't that bad either.

Technically Speaking:
This was shot with a Nikon D300 and a 17-55/2.8 lens on the camera. I had the ISO set to 200. The camera rested on a tripod that was near the ground. Long exposure noise reduction was turn on. The aperture was f/10.0 and the shutter speed was 10 seconds. I had the white balance set to sunny. The focal length of the lens was 28mm.

1 comment:

Susanne said...

Great blog, Mike. Check out mine... not as many pictures, or as well shot, but you know... we do what we can...