What went wrong? Pictures in night setting

[RalphLambrecht]

It also kicks in with low light levels. 1/30 at f2 with a 400 ISO film is OK if there's enough light, but borderline, but if there's underexposure, that will be exaggerated. Also remember that night scenes are at much lower colour temperatures compared to daylight, that has an effect on the film's effective speed.

Ian

Ian has a good point but again it's not unique to picture #3!

 

[Nige]

The Lab did it for me

Here's the reason. Pic 3 has been scanned to suit the actual scene (leave the shadows dark) where the other 2 have been scanned trying to get detail in the shadows and introducing lots of 'noise' in the process.

 

[Les Sarile]

Here's the reason. Pic 3 has been scanned to suit the actual scene (leave the shadows dark) where the other 2 have been scanned trying to get detail in the shadows and introducing lots of 'noise' in the process.

I agree as getting inexpensive scans from minilab scanners generally means they apply all the usual autocorrect settings and try to render relative dark images brighter. If you have an opportunity to have these three rescanned without autocorrect settings you may find your answer.

BTW, when it comes to color negatives, it is always better to err on the side of overexposure specially with Kodak Portra 400 that can withstand many stops of it. Night scenes with lights in the foreground can trick most meters.

 

[Chan Tran]

The brightness of the signs in #2 and #3 are not of the same brightness. The exposure is only good for the brightly lit signs If that what you want then it's ok. All other parts of the image should be print or scan as black. Of course a tripod would help as the scenes have nothing moving. Night scene has very wide brightness range and it's impossible to capture both the dark and bright area.

 

[xkaes]

haven't thought of that. No i bought a scanner yet (but planning to). The Lab did it for me

That's what I meant by "printing". If some sort of auto-correction is done in the printing or scanning (or even manual correction), you would expect these kind of differences from print to print.

 

[Pieter12]

That's what I meant by "printing". If some sort of auto-correction is done in the printing or scanning (or even manual correction), you would expect these kind of differences from print to print.

What seems odd is the first 2 are similar, the third much different. If the scanner is correcting automatically, one would think similar negatives would scan the same. OP, do you see the same difference on the negs?

 

[xkaes]

Guessing from the fact that one image has blacks, and the other two don't, I'd say they were treated differently in some way -- even if the exposures were not exactly the same.

 

[Jim Jones]

60 or 70 years ago, when Kodachrome's speed was maybe 10 or 12 ISO, I did some night photography like Joey's. Fortunately, the camera had shutter speeds down to one second, and some results were good. Exposures could be not fractions of seconds, but sometimes whole seconds if I stopped down. I often braced myself or the camera against buildings or light poles for those exposures. A tripod would have been useful, but inconvenient to pedestrians. Metering for precise exposures was usually unreliable. Bracketing the exposure wasted film, but was cheaper than returning for a reshoot.

 

[cliveh]

You need a tripod and set the aperture to about 2 stops down and expose for about 5 seconds.

 

[Pieter12]

60 or 70 years ago, when Kodachrome's speed was maybe 10 or 12 ISO, I did some night photography like Joey's. Fortunately, the camera had shutter speeds down to one second, and some results were good. Exposures could be not fractions of seconds, but sometimes whole seconds if I stopped down. I often braced myself or the camera against buildings or light poles for those exposures. A tripod would have been useful, but inconvenient to pedestrians. Metering for precise exposures was usually unreliable. Bracketing the exposure wasted film, but was cheaper than returning for a reshoot.

From what I recall, Kodachrome (at least 25 and 64, that I used) started exhibiting reciprocity failure below 1/2 second, maybe even 1/8.

 

[Ian Grant]

60 or 70 years ago, when Kodachrome's speed was maybe 10 or 12 ISO, I did some night photography like Joey's. Fortunately, the camera had shutter speeds down to one second, and some results were good. Exposures could be not fractions of seconds, but sometimes whole seconds if I stopped down. I often braced myself or the camera against buildings or light poles for those exposures. A tripod would have been useful, but inconvenient to pedestrians. Metering for precise exposures was usually unreliable. Bracketing the exposure wasted film, but was cheaper than returning for a reshoot.

I seem to remember some Kodak colour films coming with an exposure guide using graphics, and including night street scenes.

Unfortunately, the OP's Zenit E has no speeds slower than 1/30 except for B, so it's a case of thinking about areas where there is quite a lot of nighttime illumination.

Ian

 

[BrianShaw]

Wrong camera for that specific task.

 

[Chan Tran]

Wrong camera for that specific task.

I don't use film camera for low light.

 

[retina_restoration]

Wrong camera for that specific task.

If your longest shutter speed option is 1/30th, then I agree. You need a camera that allows you much longer exposures for night work.

 

[xkaes]

If your longest shutter speed option is 1/30th, then I agree. You need a camera that allows you much longer exposures for night work.

As I mentioned before, that's not the only problem. The camera's selenium meter is useless for low-light photography. So if the OP is stuck with that camera, the only option is the "B" setting -- which means a tripod or other stable platform, and a meter or low-light "cheat sheet" with bracketing.

 

[Les Sarile]

I don't use film camera for low light.

No doubt "low light" photography may mean something different to every photographer. But for my kind of "low light photography", I can't use anything but film . . .

BTW, low light photography can be very challenging even when you're using the most sophisticated gear. In my first serious attempt I was using an EOS 3 which at that time was as good a meter as was available and yet I managed to grossly underexpose this image on Fuji RVP100F film. In this case it was clearly user error as apparently the camera was trying to warn me that the result was going to be grossly underexposed but I didn't know that at that time!

Fuji RVP100F_06-22 by Les DMess, on Flickr

Since then I've learned that the EOS 3 has a maximum exposure time of 30 seconds in aperture priority mode so I used it with that limitation in mind or resort to bulb mode for exposures lasting longer.

 

[Romanko]

A photo of the negatives on the light table (monitor, tablet etc.) would be helpful.

The problem is most certainly underexposure. If you have a digital camera try setting the same aperture and shutter speed and take a few photos in similar conditions. Chances are they will look like your film images. Tip: a digital camera makes a perfect and relatively inexpensive light meter for tricky environments like night shots.

Next time use a tripod, smaller apertures and much longer shutter speeds (take into account reciprocity failure if your exposures exceed a couple of seconds). If you are a beginner, shooting digital is a much quicker way to get into night photography since you will be getting immediate feedback.

 

[Chan Tran]

No doubt "low light" photography may mean something different to every photographer. But for my kind of "low light photography", I can't use anything but film . . .

BTW, low light photography can be very challenging even when you're using the most sophisticated gear. In my first serious attempt I was using an EOS 3 which at that time was as good a meter as was available and yet I managed to grossly underexpose this image on Fuji RVP100F film. In this case it was clearly user error as apparently the camera was trying to warn me that the result was going to be grossly underexposed but I didn't know that at that time!

Fuji RVP100F_06-22 by Les DMess, on Flickr

Since then I've learned that the EOS 3 has a maximum exposure time of 30 seconds in aperture priority mode so I used it with that limitation in mind or resort to bulb mode for exposures lasting longer.

I have no problem determine correct exposure for low light with film. Just that when the light is low I can't shoot film hand held or the subject is moving a bit.

 

[Les Sarile]

I have no problem determine correct exposure for low light with film. Just that when the light is low I can't shoot film hand held or the subject is moving a bit.

I don't doubt you 1 bit.

For myself, technology isn't there yet today to be able to do what I can achieve on film.

This is a sample on the short end of the low light photography I do. Maybe technology can achieve 30 seconds but I'm not sure 10 minutes is?

Fuji 100 30 seconds and 10 minute exposures by Les DMess, on Flickr

 

[Romanko]

But for my kind of "low light photography", I can't use anything but film

I like your images but lacking experience in low-light photography (film or digital) I do not understand why this would be the case. This is a bit off-topic here but if you have time to share your experience in a different thread that would be awesome.

 

[MattKing]

I'm guessing that Les only has film cameras.

 

[loccdor]

1/30, f/2, with 400 speed is about right for a typical well lit (artificially) indoor interior at night. It's not uncommon for street lamp lit scenes to be 5 stops darker than that.

For example, I did a portrait lit by street lamp shining on a face from maybe 3 meters distance at 1/8, f/1.8, and 800 speed film, which was well exposed. That's 3 stops darker than OP's settings and it's at close range to a bright street lamp. I was able to handhold it because the lens had an image stabilizer, but just barely.

 

[abruzzi]

I like your images but lacking experience in low-light photography (film or digital) I do not understand why this would be the case. This is a bit off-topic here but if you have time to share your experience in a different thread that would be awesome.

Digital can absolutely do long 10 minute exposures, but most digital cameras I've used require 20 minutes to do a 10 minutes exposure. After taking the actual exposure, it closes the shutter and takes another 10 minute exposure with no light. This reads the noise from the sensor which is uses to remove it from the picture you just took. I don't know if this is common/required for good long exposures, but is something my digital cameras do.

 

[Les Sarile]

Digital can absolutely do long 10 minute exposures, but most digital cameras I've used require 20 minutes to do a 10 minutes exposure. After taking the actual exposure, it closes the shutter and takes another 10 minute exposure with no light. This reads the noise from the sensor which is uses to remove it from the picture you just took. I don't know if this is common/required for good long exposures, but is something my digital cameras do.

Bulb mode not aperture priority? I would be curious to see if you have it posted somewhere. TIA.

 

[koraks]

Digital can absolutely do long 10 minute exposures, but most digital cameras I've used require 20 minutes to do a 10 minutes exposure. After taking the actual exposure, it closes the shutter and takes another 10 minute exposure with no light. This reads the noise from the sensor which is uses to remove it from the picture you just took. I don't know if this is common/required for good long exposures, but is something my digital cameras do.

Which ones? I never noticed my Canon 7D doing this. Sounds like something associated with even earlier/older cameras than mine, which is already getting pretty long in the tooth.