How can I shoot long exposures in daylight without overexposing?
Asked 4/29/2014
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I'm trying to learn daytime long-exposure photography with a Canon 550D/T2i. My first attempt was in bright daylight around 6:00 PM using Manual mode, f/22, 1/30 s, and the image preview was completely white/overexposed. How do I properly make a long exposure during the day, and what settings or accessories do I need?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
12y ago
2 Answers
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Obviously, there was still way too much light getting onto your sensor despite the tiny aperture. Methods to avoid that:
- First, make sure your ISO setting is as low as possible.
- Use Tv (shutter priority) mode instead of manual, then choose the shutter speed you want and let the camera adjust everything else to get normal exposure. If that is not possible (quite likely because you got overexposure with a very small aperture already), the camera will show a warning.
- Quite likely the only thing you can do to reduce the amount of light enough while keeping the shutter speed you want is to use a neutral density filter.
Originally by user25699. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user25699
12y ago
0
Generated from our catalog & community — verify before relying on it.
Your shot was overexposed because even at f/22, 1/30 s still let in too much light for bright daylight. Also, 1/30 s is not really a long exposure for most effects.
To make daytime long exposures work:
- Set ISO to the lowest value available.
- Choose the shutter speed you want and check whether the camera can expose correctly at the smallest aperture.
- If it still overexposes, you need less light reaching the sensor.
The usual solution is a neutral density (ND) filter, which reduces light without changing color, letting you use much slower shutter speeds in daylight.
You can also use shutter priority mode to test whether your chosen shutter speed is realistic in the current light; the camera will indicate if correct exposure isn’t possible.
If you don’t have an ND filter, another option for some subjects is to take many shorter exposures and average/stack them later. This can mimic a longer exposure for things like water or other slow/random motion, but it won’t match a true continuous long exposure for fast-moving subjects.
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