Night surf shots ?

There was a full moon and I was trying to get it in the shot but couldn't quite pull it off. I know I can get this shot right when the sun has gone down but I was having a hell of a time trying to get it when it was dark.

Anyone have a idea of how to nail this shot with a high enough shutter speed that the rider isn't blurred ? I still want the shutter speed slow enough to blur the wake though.

If you can't shoot off a tripod (like here obviously) and you don't want to use a flash your best bet is a good IS lens, crank up the ISO to the max and open up your lens all the way. I've handheld my 24-105 IS down to to an 1/8th second with some success. Just fire off a bunch of shots, you may get lucky and have one without camera shake. The problem is you'll need at least 200th of a second and some luck to get no rider blur. Although that looks like a flash shot to me however. A good manual flash like a Metz54 would give you 500th+ and make that shot easy.

I was using a Canon 580 flash. I'd have to go back and look and see where I had the ISO. I was mixing it up as much as I could but just couldn't get it.

Take a look at the shot in My profile. It was taken on the same night (hand held no flash) I was hoping to achieve the same over all look with the surf shots.

Thanks for the feed back Rich.

Getting the rider and wake was fairly easy but I just couldn't get the moon in there.

Walt ~ Do you know how to make the 20d go to ISO 3200? If not, let me know and I'll hook you up. That may have done the trick for you. Anyways WTF are you doing riding at night you crazy mofo's

I would stick with ISO400 if you are using the flash. The problem is that it goes into a lower power mode and won't sync over 1/250th. But at wake surfing distances you may have more then enough flash for that range in spite of that. So I guess I'd set it at 1/500th, your largest f stop, ISO400 and high speed sync on the flash.

The answer is to change your flash settings and use rear curtain/second curtain.

This will expose the moon and fire the flash AFTER the normal exposure. Still tricky from a boat but given that you captured the moon in the first shot it looks like you could do it.

The trick will be to expose it just long enough to capture the moon but not so long that the wake/rider leave streaks.

Ant,
No I don't know how to do that so hook Me up.

Rich,
1/250 would be to fast for the effect on the wake I was looking for.

Rear,
I'm totally ignorant to second curtain technique
but I'd love to know more about it if you have the time to give me the low down.

Walt,

Custom function 8 - ISO expansion - turn it on.

You wouldn't use ISO3200 with flash though.

That's good info about the second curtain option. Never tried it and wasn't totally clear about what it did until I read rear curtain's explanation, good info. I think what happens is the flash fires just in time while the shutter is closing rather then when it first opens. I think it eliminates "flash trails" which may be part of the effect you're seeing in that first picture. Maybe Rear Curtain can expound on this more. Time to get my 430EX out and play around with it!

I really have a long way to go as far as having My flash figured out. I really need to spend more time using it and reading up on it.

You guys are kicking down some great info !

Rear curtain sync actually won't help you much here. All that will do is fire the flash at the end of the exposure, instead of at the beginning. That will matter when you're looking to have motion trails of something in a shot, and you want the flash to freeze things at the end of the motion trails. Here, you don't have motion in a specific decision, so rear curtain isn't the answer.

The answer here is to run the camera in manual mode. Expose for your background. Keep your foreground 2 stops underexposed or so. Use your flash (preferably in Manual mode) to fill in the foreground. This is similar to fill flash, but just to an extreme. What you are trying to do is doable... but you need LESS hotlights on the wakesurfer. In other words, turn off the tower lights, so it doesn't fill in during the exposure. Then, you can expose longer for your background, and still use the flash to fill in (and freeze) the rider. You can have a 10 second exposure, and as long as the rider's in the dark the whole time, the flash will freeze him as though he was shot at 1/1000th.

Mike,

Will a 10 second exposure work (or any long exposure FTM) given the boat movement if he's trying to keep the moon sharp in the shot? What you suggested makes perfect sense except for the moon in my mind, wouldn't that end up being 1 big blur?

I'm not visualizing a way to keep the rider sharp, moon/clouds sharp and having the wake blur which is what I think Walt was aiming for given the boat movement.

it's cheating but take 2 shots. 1 long exposure shot to capture your scene and another of the moon using the sunny 16 rule.

RD,

10 seconds was just a random number... but in order to have the moon sharp, naturally you'll expose for the moon at a decent shutter speed. With IS, you could probably go as slow as 1 second (with practice) and have acceptable results. It would be easier to do this with a gyro. The difficulty with this shot is complicated by the fact that it's being shot with a wide-angle lens... that will make the moon very small in the frame. It would be much better if you could shoot it with a 300mm+, from further back, and use telephoto compression to make the moon larger in the frame. Not possible from the angle he wants to shoot from, though.

As Sean said, 2 shots would be the way to go. If you're still shooting film, simply double-expose... shoot a whole roll of moon shots, tight, with a long lens (300-600mm) in the same area of the frame, then remember where the moon was in the frame and re-shoot the roll with the rider. Nothing wrong with that, in my opinion.

You're also going to run into a problem of having the wake blur yet have the rider sharp. That means very selective lighting. It's doable but not easy. It would look best if you gelled the hotlights with a CTB gel (conversion from tungsten - BLUE), to make the tower lights daylight balanced. Underexpose the wake and rider by one stop or so, then pop a flash just on the rider. You might need to get the flash off-camera, and zoom in the flash head, to do this.

It's not an easy shot, but it can be done.

There you go Walt!

That's good stuff Mike!

So maybe just get the rider as sharp as possible using a fast shutter & manual fill flash and then add the moon (shot as Mike outlined) / blur the wake in PS.

This is what I had in mind as far as the wake blur.

I'll give it another try when I get a chance.

Thanks again for the input guys !

and if you don't have the wireless equipment to get the flash off camera just get someone else to and aim and fire the flash when asked.

(Message edited by CAskimmer on June 13, 2006)

Walt:
i thought it was illegal to wakesurf/board after sunset anywhere in cali. is ther a way to do it it legally w/ lights?

oz

Rob,
You are correct and no light don't make it legal.