Multiple Exposures?

PhotoTyler

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How much do you underexpose for multiple exposure? How many stops for each extra shot?

I wanna take a bunch of multiple exposure stuff of the ocean, but i don't know how to expose for it.

Thanks for your help, i'm leaving tommorow morning, so i'd like to know quick if possible.
 

dlin

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Hi,

I just tried this out recently, and it's fairly easy to calculate. As an example, if your metered reading suggests a 1/2 second exposure, you can build up the exposure by exposing 15 times at 1/30 sec (i.e. 15 x 1/30 = 1/2). You can use faster shutter speeds, but that will require many more exposures to build up to the final desired value. I don't believe there is any compensation to worry about until you get to much longer total exposure times.

Hope that helps,

Daniel

 
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PhotoTyler

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oooh! okay, that makes sense! thank you a lot, and thanks more for a quick response.
 

Aggie

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also some quick tricks for multi exposures. Anything against a light background has an etheral look, almost ghost like. Those against a dark background will stand out and be very sharp.
 

Jim Moore

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I've said it before and I'll say it again.......

This is what I love about APUG. You ask a question and usually within minutes you get helpful answers.

Jim
 

Les McLean

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Take a meter reading as normal with the lens fully stopped down. Decide which shutter speed you want to use, clearly it must be a faster shutter speed than indicated by the meter reading. To arrive at the number of exposures needed using the faster shutter speed divide the slower speed into the faster speed. For example, the meter reading is 1/4 second at f22 but you wish to use 1/125th second at f22, divide 125 by 4, the answer is 31 multiple exposures at 1/125th. As a check that the multiple exposure is correct first make single exposure using the metered reading and then make your multiple exposure. When the film is developed the two adjacent negatives should be almost identical in density.

I've used this method for nearly 30 years and found it very reliable. The image of Roughting Linn on the home page is a multiple exposure.
 
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PhotoTyler

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Thank you guys! this will help a ton! you guys on here are the most helpful people on the interenet, especially in photogrpahy! Thanks!
 

tbm

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Multiple exposures

An easy method is to double the film speed for the first shot and double it again for the second. For example, if you are using, say, Delta 100, your first shot would be taken with your camera set at a film speed of 200, then you would change the camera film speed to 400 and shoot the second one. For a third exposure you would double the 400 to 800.

Several weeks ago I went out to shoot amongst a crowd of tourists with the intention of capturing some double and some triple exposures. I set the 180mm lens on my Leica R8 to f/4 and the metering to matrix. I pressed the button atop the R8 which prevents the film from advancing, thus allowing multiple exposures until it is released. The attached photo was obtained on Technical pan film. Since I was shooting Technical Pan at ISO 50 rather than 25, for the first exposure I doubled it to 100, for the second I doubled that to 200, and for the third I doubled that to 400. I had been laughing while watching people fiddling with the control buttons on their digital cameras, seeking help from others around them, observing many extending their fingers and arms all over the place, and banging into others as they went into a semi coma attempting to use their tiny digtal camera displays and viewfinders, missing many shots in the process amidst their confusion. I realized a triple exposure would successfully capture the confusion around me and that is what I accomplished. It is great fun seeking source material for double and triple exposures! You must remember,though, where the main point of interest was situated on the first shot in order not to wipe it out with a point of interest on the second shot. Like mastering all photographic skills, practice, practice, practice.
 
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roy

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One of the types of multiple exposure that interests me, is the effect created by UK photographer and teacher John Blakemore, who achieved a 'transparent' look where he was building up images rather in the form of layers. Looking at a still life for example, you would realise that there were other images underneath, not strikingly obvious at first glance. That, I would like to try but am not sure how to go about it. He also made some images in a 'windscape' series, where the foliage on trees took on the appearance of cotton wool and I assume that was by using the technique outlined by Les.
 

Les McLean

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Roy

John's still life images are photographed at various stages as he arranges them so that those elements that were in the frame as he started to construct it receive full exposure and those placed in the set up part the way through receive only partial exposure hence the ghost like appearance.

The wind series that you mention were a mix of multiple and long single exposures in very windy conditions. As I write I'm looking at two of his multiple exposure water images and one of the trees in Ambergate Derbyshire where he shot the "Leila" series. They have been a constant source of inspiration and pleasure in the 20 years that I have had them.
 

Nige

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I've used Les's method (multiple short exposures to make one long exposure) for some seascapes although I have used mental gymnastics to work out how many exposures to make! The method Les has suggested above looks much easier for my brain assuming I've got a calculator handy! Why I chose to use this method rather than the usual one long exposure is, in some circumstances (eg. waves flowing around a rock) in one 8sec exposure you might get 1 or 2 significant movements, where with the multiple exposures you can pick you slices of time and incorporate more movement in your shot. You can even time the shots so that other elements (like people, birds) aren't in any of the shots. The end result is definetly different, and something that needs to be experimented with.
 

roy

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I suppose this would lead to dense negatives if the picture were to be made too complicated.


One of C.W.'s first lecture workshops under the 'Quest' banner was with John Blakemore where he talked about his tulip obsession. Although we did not see any of his other subject matter, the photographs we were shown were excellent. While I have participated in several of your practical workshops and learnt a lot I might say, John's lecture was not so much about technical aspects of photography but the reasons for it all and although we did have technical question and answer later, he was certainly an inspitation to us.
 

Les McLean

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lallan

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I saw some interesting multiple exposure prints last year by Lucien Clergue at the John Stevenson Gallery in NYC (Dead Link Removed). Apparently, Clergue takes daylight rated film, makes exposures indoors, and then lets the film sit for about a year, then goes out and exposures outdoors over the same negatives. The prints are very interesting. ....lyle
 

jd callow

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I wrote a long essay for this thread giving my experience. My browser crashed and it disappeared into nothingness. I don't have it in me to re type the whole thing.

This discussion appears to be all B/W related. I will throw my 2p in about colour.

Unlike b/w colour can stand over exposure. When I do multi-exposure shots of varying subject I never expose under 2/3 of stop (anything less produces insignificant noise) and try not to exceed a cumulative exposure of 0 1 stop over. I am careful about my set up and film. Fuji colour print film does not suffer over exposure as well as Kodak's portra film. When setting up if one of the exposures is to have greater significance I give it more exposure at the expense of others.

I tend to add time for each exposure as follows:
1st 2/3 under
2nd 1/2 under
3rd 1/3 under
4th on the mark or 1/4 under​

Examples (please excuse the crap cc and the fact one of the images is flopped. I did these scans in a rush the night before a show and have never returned to fix them.):
Dead Link Removed Dead Link Removed
Dead Link Removed Dead Link Removed​
 
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Ed Sukach

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VERY LARGE THANKS for leading me to this web site!!!

There is some truly brilliant work here.... One of the most interesting series I've seen in a long time is the "Box" series by David Halliday.

Again, THANKS!!
 

roy

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Aggie

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I sometimes shoot upward of 10 or more images pers negative. Here are a couple of examples, and when the darn scanner quits having a hissy I can show 3 more. It was a series I was doing to experiment with the Button on my Mamiya's. The first one was a pure accident. I didn't know I had it depressed. That negative has about 35 images on it. Yet it is the least dense of the bunch.
 

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doughowk

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I've tried multiple exposures as described in Les McLean's book; but have a few problems. All my LF lens are old. Their slower shutter speeds appear to be off by alot. And they all require manual cocking. I would think the manual cocking would jar the camera enough to blur the image, even when on a sturdy tripod. Since my exposure times are long ( several seconds), was thinking of using a black hat, etc., to cover lens between exposures. Any suggestions?
 

Ole

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Doug,
All my LF lenses are old too. I trust the times to be approximate, and usually stick with times I can check by ear. They also need manual cocking.

Yet I have had no problem at all using the LesMcLean Mulitexposure technique, with 16 exposures each 1/4 second the result was even better than I hoped. Use a sturdy tripod, a heavy camera, and clamp everything down tight.

This is one of the few situations where an old Linhof Technika III 5x7" is better than a brand new exotic-wood-and-titanium camera!
 

Andy K

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The simplest method I have used is to shoot the first exposure at night and the second during the day... To date these are my favourite multi-exposures, made with a compact 35mm camera. (because it was easy to wind reset the shutter without moving the film)
 

Sino

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I've read carefully, but here's a question about Les' method: what if i want to do a certain number of exposures instead of having a certain shutter speed i want to go for? How would i divide the original exposure?

e.g. dividing 1/125 into three exposures.

Would i shoot three exposures of 1/45 [three stops down of 1/125 for each of the three exposures] or divide 125 by 3 and match it with the closest shutter time?


-Sino.
 
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