Shooting Christmas Lights

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Donald is #1

Member
Does anyone have any recommendations on shooting Christmas decorations/lights? ; Since I will have my DSLR with me for Pixelmania (plus the sunset safari that I am doing at the end of my trip), I was thinking about bringing my tripod into the parks in the evenings. ; I have never really photographed Christmas lights before besides a few last year (no tripod) and the results were only ok.
 
absolutely 100% necessary to have and use the tripod, nothing else will get the shot, search osborne light threads on here, esp from last year mousefest, tripod shots from many, including tim and myself, we will have our pods along, we are pod people
 
If you focus on/ meter off the lights themselves, your pics will be very underexposed. ; I often find myself setting the exposure compensation to +1 in order to capture
more of the ambient details. ; I would practice around the house until you start to get the feel for it. ;
 
It definitely can be done without a tripod, but I wouldn't recommend it. ; If you've only got a few strands of lights in the shot, try experimenting with an aperture like f/11-16. ; That should produce a twinkle or 'star filter' effect on the lights. ; If there are lots of lights (Osborne lights, Main Street), I would use a smaller aperture. ; Not really any other tricks that I can think of!
 
I got a blog for this: Photographing Christmas Lights at Disney

Make sure check out the the link at the end of the article for more tips.

I didn't do too bad last year without a tripod but using one is the best way.

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I have a question for you guys about Christmas light bokeh. ; I've been doing some test shots with some ornaments and other stuff (don't laugh), and thus far have not had much luck. ; I assume the best bet for getting pleasing circular bokeh is using a higher focal length (I've tried 50mm @ f/1.8 and 200mm @ f/5.6), wide open aperture, and placing the lights as far from the ornament as possible.

I want the bokeh to look like this (see below), or as close to that as possible, except with ornaments, or whatever, in the foreground:


Any advice, article links, or suggestions would be appreciated. ; I'm really hoping the suggestion is not that I need to get a 105mm f/2.8 macro lens or something like that. ; If that is the suggestion, any ideas for extremely cheap (old manual focus lenses) options?
 
Bokeh is a function of the lens, so each will be different. MOST of the pro 2.8 lenses will have nice bokeh, but it is all a mater of taste, and what you are going for. (FWIW, Jack's has a 105D and a 135 DC (YUM!) in their used section).
 
"mPower" said:
Bokeh is a function of the lens, so each will be different. MOST of the pro 2.8 lenses will have nice bokeh, but it is all a mater of taste, and what you are going for. (FWIW, Jack's has a 105D and a 135 DC (YUM!) in their used section).
Click to expand...

Thanks; ; I actually figured it out myself. ; Luckily the solution does not require spending more money. ; That works out well since I don't have more money to spend!
 
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