How to make people disappear?

RattyMouse · Nov 21, 2014

I want to try using long exposure times to get people out of my cityscape type images. I know that the speed that they are walking across my image is part of the determining factor for shutter times. Can someone give me a good starting point for how to do this? Should I start with 10 second exposures? 30 seconds?

What type of ND filter do you tend to use in nice daylight situations? Do you have to go all the way to 10 stops?

Thanks for the help!

AgX · Nov 21, 2014

It depends on direction of movement. As with freezing movement. Only contrary.

RattyMouse · Nov 21, 2014

AgX said:
It depends on direction of movement. As with freezing movement. Only contrary.

Well, in crowds you have people moving every direction. So in this situation I'm looking for guidance. I guess I should try it with a lame camera and then use my film one.

Arvee · Nov 21, 2014

It's been years since I played with that concept and I don't recall any of the exposure details but I used a Nikon ND400 (9 stops) filter with good results. I think Hoya makes one also. I recall that it rated 400 speed film around ISO 1 or so.

Tripod is not optional!!

HTH

Bill Burk · Nov 21, 2014

RattyMouse,

You can use some of the latitude towards overexposure instead of an ND filter. For my simulation of "Pedestrian's Foot" I used "B" and gave 1-2 seconds - completely ignoring the "correct" exposure and staying intent on the correct "movement". The negative was more dense than a correctly exposed negative, but printed easily.

scheimfluger_77 · Nov 21, 2014

This is the realm of pinhole, where it's easy to get exposures in the 10's of minutes. Unless you have milling crowds, it's amazing how well they disappear. if you are sticking with a lensed camera, the slowest film you can find and at least a 5-stop ND filter would be good start. Think in terms of minutes, not seconds.

RattyMouse · Nov 21, 2014

Bill Burk said:
RattyMouse,

You can use some of the latitude towards overexposure instead of an ND filter. For my simulation of "Pedestrian's Foot" I used "B" and gave 1-2 seconds - completely ignoring the "correct" exposure and staying intent on the correct "movement". The negative was more dense than a correctly exposed negative, but printed easily.

2 seconds and crowds of people disappeared? That's all it took? Do you have a photo to illustrate this?

RattyMouse · Nov 21, 2014

scheimfluger_77 said:
This is the realm of pinhole, where it's easy to get exposures in the 10's of minutes. Unless you have milling crowds, it's amazing how well they disappear. if you are sticking with a lensed camera, the slowest film you can find and at least a 5-stop ND filter would be good start. Think in terms of minutes, not seconds.

I'm interested in a suggested starting time so perhaps 1 minute will do. I can experiment with Neopan Acros and cutting out as much light as I can.

Bill Burk · Nov 21, 2014

RattyMouse said:
2 seconds and crowds of people disappeared? That's all it took? Do you have a photo to illustrate this?

Not crowds, but the body of my kid's gone leaving only a pant leg and a foot...

Dr Croubie · Nov 21, 2014

First thing to do might be to just sit where you want to take a photo, and watch people in the field of view that you want.
Time how long it takes for the average person to move either from left to right, or front of field to where they're in the vanishing point.
From there, I dunno, but you'd probably want to at least double that.

Lee Big Stopper (10 stop) is very popular with the digital crowds for this sort of thing (and I don't see why it wouldn't be popular with film users too).

winger · Nov 21, 2014

I wanted to do some longish exposures at car shows to have the cars visible and people as blurs. I wasn't looking for them to disappear. I tried with a pinhole at the one show I made it to this summer and could not find any people in the shot at about 8 seconds. Your best bet might be to bracket a bit.

Truzi · Nov 22, 2014

I thought this was going to be a joke about pulling out a slide projector

Yes, probably pinhole territory. I did try this with my cigar-box pinhole camera. I was experimenting - the hole was made with one of my father's insulin needles (very tiny), I put an ND filter over it, and used Harmon Direct Positive paper. I had done some math on exposure for all of this (and I'm bad at math), but have misplaced it at the moment. That, and I've not developed the paper yet, so I can't give time suggestions.

RattyMouse · Nov 22, 2014

Truzi said:
I thought this was going to be a joke about pulling out a slide projector

Yes, probably pinhole territory. I did try this with my cigar-box pinhole camera. I was experimenting - the hole was made with one of my father's insulin needles (very tiny), I put an ND filter over it, and used Harmon Direct Positive paper. I had done some math on exposure for all of this (and I'm bad at math), but have misplaced it at the moment. That, and I've not developed the paper yet, so I can't give time suggestions.

No, this is not solely pinhole territory. I just saw this morning some digital shots from a Leica user who made Shanghai look absolutely EMPTY of people. I just wish he said how long of an exposure it took to get that effect. Hundreds of people in the scene, none on the photograph.

Molli · Nov 22, 2014

Hi RattyMouse,
One thing you want to be aware of is where, precisely, you're shooting. I did much the same thing in the city closest to me and, stupidly, included a café with outdoor seating in the scene. I was deliberately double and triple exposing each frame to ditch the people while still being able to use short exposure times (e.g. 3 exposures of 1/15th of a second, spaced around fifteen seconds apart, left me with pale blurs of people, barely noticeable). Unfortunately, the people seated at the café were more or less still in the same positions throughout that time frame, with only their heads moving..... I made me some gargoyles that day!

mono · Nov 22, 2014

You wouldn´t believe: There were visitors wandering around while I took this image! Some noticed me photographing and tried to hurry out of the scene but I said don´t worry it´s a long time exposure! Some couldn´t imagine what I was doing ;-)
I don´t remember the exact data but I think it was something around 45 seconds or so. A tripod was used of course!

http://www.monoart.de/photo_5257311.html

Ian Grant · Nov 22, 2014

I'd use a different approach, shoot when there's no-one about. I do that when in Turkey at popular tourist destinations, Ephesus is one example, it's normally full of coach loads of tourists, but get there early and it's quiet, easy to get the shots I want, it's also an awful lot cooler

Iam

gone · Nov 22, 2014

Looks like mono's solution is one to work with. Excellent images on your site too.

mono · Nov 22, 2014

Thanx a lot, momus!
Much appreciated ;-)

TheToadMen · Nov 22, 2014

I once made a 30 minute exposure inside an old church (paper negative 18x24 cm). Some people came wandering in, looked at the altar for a while and moved on. None of them showed up in the image. One guy stood there for maybe 8 minutes or so and he is barely visible like a faint ghost.

Bert from Holland
http://thetoadmen.blogspot.nl

RattyMouse · Nov 22, 2014

Thanks for all the replies! I messed around with one of my D cameras on a tripod. Looks like 15 seconds is enough to knock most people out of the shot. I thought i'd need 1-2 minutes to do that. Can't wait to try this with film next!

jp80874 · Nov 22, 2014

I use a pair of angry, growling, barking, 70 pound dogs on what looks like a flimsy leash. The people just disappear before I take the picture. The dogs are also useful for announcing the people who come up behind you when you are under the dark cloth.

John Powers

Rick A · Nov 22, 2014

My first thought when I saw the title of the thread was, "simple, just fart in the room".

wy2l · Nov 22, 2014

Higher taxes.

Rick A · Nov 22, 2014

Soylent green......

TheToadMen · Nov 22, 2014

Rick A said:
Soylent green......

How to make people disappear?

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