How do I photograph a night skyline with a person in the foreground without blur?
Asked 7/15/2017
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I want to shoot a night skyline and also include a person standing about 6 feet from the camera. A long shutter speed works well for the skyline, but the person becomes blurry because they can’t stay perfectly still that long. I have a Nikon D7200, two flashes, a 35mm prime, and an 18-300mm zoom. What’s the best way to light and expose both the skyline and the person at night?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
9y ago
2 Answers
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You can do this with a single exposure. Use a longish shutter speed to expose the background and the flash to properly expose and freeze your subject. You'll likely need to have your camera on a tripod or other stable support, such as a table. This technique is often referred to as 'dragging the shutter' or 'slow shutter sync'.
Most cameras will default to slow shutter sync if the camera is set to Aperture Priority (Av) exposure mode and a TTL flash is detected on the hot shoe when the ambient light is below a specific brightness level.
Many cameras have a built in scene mode that automatically does this. Canon and Nikon both call it Night Portrait Mode. Olympus calls it Night Scene Mode. Others have similar names for it.
For the ultimate in control, use Manual exposure mode and manual flash. Set the ISO, aperture (Av), and shutter time (Tv) for the ambient light in the background, then set the flash power to properly illuminate your subject in the foreground with the selected ISO, Av, and Tv. Getting the flash off camera and using a flash modifier to soften the light from the flash will also help, as will gelling the flash to match the ambient lighting.
Relevant:
What is the difference between 'P' mode vs. the scene modes?
Why isn't aperture priority mode automatically adjusting the shutter speed on my Nikon?
Originally by user15871. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user15871
9y ago
0
Generated from our catalog & community — verify before relying on it.
Use flash with a long exposure. Put the camera on a tripod, expose the skyline with a relatively slow shutter speed, and use flash to light and freeze the person. This is commonly called slow-sync flash or “dragging the shutter.”
A typical approach is:
- Keep the camera stable on a tripod.
- Choose exposure settings for the skyline/ambient light.
- Use flash on the foreground subject so the flash burst freezes them.
You can often do this in a camera’s Night Portrait mode, or more precisely in Manual exposure with flash. Aperture Priority with TTL flash may also enable slow-sync behavior automatically on some cameras.
The key idea is that shutter speed mainly controls the ambient skyline exposure, while the flash handles the person. Ask the subject to stay as still as possible, since any movement before or after the flash can still create ghosting.
An alternative is to shoot separate frames and combine them later, but a single exposure with slow-sync flash is usually the simplest solution.
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