How To Shoot In Dark, Winter Light: Equipment
by Amanda on December 18, 2009
To start off our Shooting in Winter Light feature, I would like to discuss the art of changing one’s attitude and how to use the equipment you have in your own home. I’m not one of those photographers who goes out and buys every new camera and lens as soon as they are released. Photography is one hobby where you could easily get sucked up into the endless turnover of new technologies. I refuse to buy into that nonsense.
{ CAMERAS and LENSES}
YOU make the photographs, you tell the stories, not your supply of expensive lenses and flash equipment. Now that I have that out of the way, let’s look at what I do have available. My main kit consists of:
Canon 40D, Canon 50mm 1.4, Canon 135mm 2.8, a couple of zooms
Nikon FM3a, Nikkor 28mm 2.8 AIS (yes, just the one lens)
Yashica FX3, Contax 50mm 1.9
Polaroid SX70, Polaroid SLR680, Polaroid Spectra
Of course, I have many more film cameras but these are the ones I use the most.
As I have mentioned before, I don’t use flash. I shoot in natural light, so finding that light at this time of year is tricky. Luckily with my DSLR, I use the brilliant Canon 50mm 1.4 which manages to find light where there isn’t much. If you are wanting to shoot in low light, I cannot recommend a lens like this enough. The 50mm 1.8 is the most economical, value for money lens you can buy. I used that lens for a long time before upgrading to the 1.4. The Sigma 30mm 1.4 is more pricey but a wider angle.
{ ISO SETTINGS & WHITE BALANCE }
I always like to shoot with my ISO on 100 as I find you get the best picture quality at that level. This is the first change I am going to have to make. With a dark, overcast sky, an ISO of 100 may give me blurry shots, so I need to start setting it a little higher. Even if you use a point and shoot, you can still manually change your ISO settings. Depending on how dark, you may want to set it to 400 to see how you go. Play around with what gives you better quality without it looking noisy. DSLRs handle ISO noise pretty well these days. However, to combat the common noise problem, there are software programs out there to help such as Noise Ninja and Neat Image. I use Neat Image myself.
Play with your White Balance settings. Most cameras give you the option to change them, use this feature. It will make a world of difference to your photos. The Auto setting can often leave your photos flat. The cloudy setting will warm up your photos, whereas the tungsten can be used indoors to take away orange colour casts from lighting. You can also change your K settings. This is a good in depth article on White Balance. If you really want to have control over the lighting, the best thing to do is to shoot in RAW.
Of course, to avoid camera shake and unsteady cold hands, the use of a tripod is always going to get you sharper pictures.
{ FILM CHOICE }
Setting the ISO on your digital camera brings me now to film choices. My preferred film of choice is Kodak Portra 160NC. It makes beautiful skin tones and creates gorgeous, low saturated colours and tones that I love. However, once again, here is a change I will need to make. I now am going to have to start buying film with a higher ISO that allows me to shoot in the winter light. Thankfully Kodak make the same gorgeous film with a 400 ISO.
Films I would like to experiment with:
- Kodak Portra 400NC and Kodak Portra 400VC
- Kodak Black and White Tri-X 400
- Fuji Pro400H
- Ilford Delta 400 (Pretty sure I’ve used this before, as I generally shoot Ilford when I shoot BW)
I have used Portra 400NC indoors before and was very happy with the results. Now I just need to start using it all the time! I will be back here soon with some film comparisons to share with you.
{ LIGHT SOURCES }
Finding the light without a flash is going to be my biggest hurdle, especially when I can’t really make changes to my Polaroid equipment set up. This is where my one purchase comes in. I would like to introduce to you the Lowel Ego Lighting System. I still want to shoot indoors with available window light but when there isn’t much coming through the windows, I am going to employ some outside help. This lighting system is far cheaper than buying professional studio lights but still costs a little to set up. I’ve only just ordered it, so I will share my first shots with you as soon as it arrives.
If you still think this may above your budget, there are lots of different kinds of DIY lighting set ups you can make with things you have at home. Check these out:
Of course, you can always get yourself a flash. I find on camera flashes to be harsh and down right horrible, even on a DSLR. If you do want to go down the flash route, I recommend saving up for an external flash unit that you attach to the hot shoe on your camera.
These are some changes I plan on making to my photography in the darker months. In the next part of the series, I will be sharing some of my experiments with you and talking about shooting in the snow. Let me know if you try any of these tips and if you have success!
Related posts:
All of these tips are wonderful and thank you for taking the time to write on the topic.
I just wanted to make sure that I understood: what is the lowest aperture the sigma will go to?
I may be wrong but I think you meant low f stop and not aperture. A low aperture would be f/16 for example and a high aperture would be f/1.4 for example.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aperture#Maximum_and_minimum_apertures
Yes I was referring to f stop, not small and large aperture. Sorry for the confusion.
The Sigma I think has a minimum aperture of f 16.
I edited it so not to confuse, sorry about that!
Thanks for this. I have so much to learn. I just read your WB reference @ Flickr — will play around with it now.
i just finished taking a whole slew of indoor photos: of my room, cups in the kitchen, my dogs… i took your advice and played around with my camera’s iso and white balance settings. it took me a while to figure it out, but i finally got really good looking shots. i’m so happy, and hopeful. thanks again.
Hello Amanda. Concerning equipment, I use the Canon 50 mm 1.8 which I find very good (I keep an eye on the 1.4 anyway …) and the Sigma 30 mm 1.4 which I find really amazing. It’s worth it’s price !
All great tips! I would add only one (and it may be obvious, but I’ll throw it out here anyway) – take a really good look around your house for well-lit spots. I’ve found that the top of my living room radiator gets a good amount of light even on dark winter days, so if I need to photograph something small for my blog, that has become my go-to “studio.” With my 50mm 1.8, I can get good portraits of people standing or sitting in the same spot. No flash required!
Thank you for this article! So great!
I’ve had my eye on the canon 50mm 1.8 for a while now, but I wonder if it is worth the wait (and price difference) to save up for the 1.4… So far I only have the kit lens and the 80mm 2.8.
Katrina, hooray!
Catherine, the Sigma is next on my list of lenses I would like to get.
Alli, yes that is definitely a great tip. Finding the right light is something I’ve talked about in previous articles. If you can figure out the best window area where the light is filling in, that’s the place to do your indoor shooting. In my old apartment, I often set up a mini studio in my bathroom because that room had the best window light in the whole house.
Mausumi, there isn’t a HUGE amount of difference with the 2 lenses. The bokeh is sweeter with the 1.4 and picture quality seems a little better. I definitely enjoyed the difference but many may not find a huge difference. You will enjoy the difference between 1.8 from 2.8, that’s for sure.
Thanks for all the great comments everyone. I’m glad this has been of some help, so far. :)
thanks for the lighting tip…checked it out on bhvideo…could you use this for portraits….
Hey Amanda,
Thanks for stopping by and giving me your feedback at my blog. I am new to blogging so I am just trying to figure out where to go from here. I am not blogging to compare myself to others but when I read other blogs they seem so much more together and such. You are right I am really doing it for myself and I should not worry so much..
Amanda – I love photography – can’t wait to explore more of your lovely blog and learn from you. Thanks for stopping by my blog! Happy wintry holidays!
Dear Amanda, thank you for sharing, the article is very helpful! I do have to care more about WB settings! i really forget often to change the setting or i do expect too much from the auto !
Thanks so much for this Amanda! I live in Hawaii so low light isn’t a big concern for me, but I really don’t like using a flash either. Having learned to shoot on a completely manual camera to learning to shoot with a DSLR, I’ve had some trouble. Suddenly my camera does everything and more, but I like the photos less! I’m going to go start using your tips and explore these settings on my camera. Thanks again!
LOL Julie, that’s probably because it’s not film. :P
yay! thank you for this!
I’ve been experimenting with different films lately and I recently shot a roll of Pro 400H and a roll of Portra 400NC back to back. I’m not expecting the photos to be anything special–I wasn’t really feeling it that day–but I’m interested to see how they compare. I’ll let you know how they turn out when I get them back :)