[Cuthbert]

That's a great set of night shots...thanks for sharing. My night photography is horrible...I need practice.

My problem is that I like to walk and do sort of "street photography" so I can't really use a tripod for it, and I always thought that hand held night photography was impossible, then I found that in certain circumstance with certain lenses and certain films you can do it...of course the result is that you really take a pic of light like in the movie Tron...which I like.

What you need is:

1) Good SHARP lens wide open, f1.8 or better
2) A camera you can grip well and be stable at 1/30 and 1/60
3) a relatively fast film (400 ASA min)
4) Forget about the lightmeter...it always said you are underexposing.

Some other examples of hand held night shot:





The most astonishing results I got above were taken with my Spottie F and the Takumar 55m f1.8 and 50 mm f1.4 wide open. Notice that pic 1 looks like a daylight pic.



Powerplant taken with K1000 K55 mm f2.0





These were taken I think with the Zorki 6.





Almaz 103 and Volna 50 mm f1.8.

In all the case the shots were taken wide open and the shutter speed was either 1/30 or 1/60.

---

Last edited by Cuthbert; 11-29-2014 at 07:39 PM.

[IHS]

Thanks...I'm bad about trusting a light meter. Apparently I need to get over it! Those turned out really well and I love how the water looks on that power plant shot. I notice you shoot a lot of black and white but I assume the same rules apply to color. I get a lot of blur when attempting to shoot neon signs for some reason. I probably havn't been using a fast enough film...I'll give 800 a shot. Thanks again...

[Jonathan Mac]

I recently saw some great hand-held night results on Agfa Vista 200 (Fuji C200) pushed to 1600 and developed as B&W. I have some Tri-X in my MX right now and have been using it for hand-held night shooting. I'll push it to 1600 in development, stand development if I can (never done it before).

[Cuthbert]

Thanks...I'm bad about trusting a light meter. Apparently I need to get over it! Those turned out really well and I love how the water looks on that power plant shot. I notice you shoot a lot of black and white but I assume the same rules apply to color. I get a lot of blur when attempting to shoot neon signs for some reason. I probably havn't been using a fast enough film...I'll give 800 a shot. Thanks again...

Few things about the lightmeter and night photography: first most of the cameras I used (Spotmatic and K1000) do have a CdS lightmeter with little accuracy in low light (3 Ev for the K1000, declared 1.7 for the Spottie but it's optimistic) and average mean on all the screen, as you can see in these case you take pictures of very bright points (lights) surrounded by perfect black, so the average is low, for these applications better cameras would be the the Nikon F2AS (-2 Ev) and the LX (-6.5 Ev) and/or something with a partial or spotmeter (Canon F-1 with the right screens, for instance).

Second thing B&W is more resilient to underexposure than colour, I tried some colour shots and I didn't like them because of this and also because most road lightning has a yellow tint that changes all the other colours and I didn't like the resons.

P.S. You also have to be as stable as possible when you shoot.

[rob1234]

Some old ones...archery lesson with Nikon FM, Nikkor 50mm f1.4 and BW400CN:



This should be a night shot with my Pentax K1000, hand held, always BW400CN:

Nice shot, great focus, and remarkably grain free for 35mm ASA400! Do you use any NR software?

[Cuthbert]

Nice shot, great focus, and remarkably grain free for 35mm ASA400! Do you use any NR software?

Rob, I don't even have an idea of what an "NR software" is, I already exposed my shooting philosophy in a heated discussion on this thread, if I remember correctly: I do film photography because I want to be in control of every aspect of the shot, that means composition, exposure, focusing, what I do is to shoot, then I go to the lab (usually Boots because it's cheap even if they ruined some films), I ask for C-41 development, printing on 7x5 and scan on CD. Then I come back home I upload the pics on a website to share them here or on other place.

This is what I do...this is all I do.

The definition of these pictures are merit of the fabulous (for me) BW400CN, my favourite film, sadly discontinued by Kodak, that kepts its promise of being the best B&W grain on the market (Delta 400 is the second one, but that's a true B&W), now I am forced to use Ilford Xp2 but IMO it's mediocre in comparison, especially because it looks "washed out" to me, if you appreciate the definition of this picture I have a small gallery of BW400CN here for you:





Took these two shots with a £20 Zenit 12XP, pratically NOS, Helios 44 and a yellow filter, the detail of the wall of London bridge are astonishing, my then landlord lobbied me for having picture 1 and another one enlarged as much as the lab could and he framed them, now they are in his dining room and always says all his friends are surprised to see how good these pics are. The young fellow of the lab the day I retired the enlargement asked me "how many pixels" my camera had...nuff said.

https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/41-photo-critique/245699-architecture-mak...volutions.html

Link to the first pic I posted in the critique area, taken with my K1000...I enlarged and framed it and now it's in my bedroom, probably the first shoot I became proud of and made me think I could be a "serious" photographer, today probably I would use a yellow filter too but still it's nice IMO.



Shot with my Leica M4-P at nightime after the rain...I like the young couple walking out.



Royal Albert hall from the Prince Albert Monument: I just had the 55 mm and I couldn't frame the entire building, sorry, but I was against the gate of the monument...still the details are very good.



Trivial test shot of an industrial machine with my Leningrad, just to test the complicated soviet rangefinder was working, still very sharp.



Not the sharpest of the bunch but in Northern Italy in wintertime there's always some haze (sometimes thick fog), this is the Old Bridge of Verona taken with my Leica M5...bridges are hard to shoot to me because they are long and generally low, but I like the atmosphere of this shot.



Peacock showing the butt to the tourists...same series as the archery training. Already posted I think



This is the definition you can expect from a 1940 German camera (Leica IIIb) and a 1962 Soviet Lens (I-61 first generation, all chrome).



Same camera but collapsible I-50...I don't like how it was developed because it has a sort of greenish hue, but still the definition is pretty good.






Not very far there is a shop where they sell miniatures for strategy games like Warhammer and the sci-fi equivalent (I don't remember the name), one night I passed there with my F2AS loaded with BW400CN, I remained fascinated by the details of these models the kids paint and decided to take two shots: in the first unfortunately one part of the starship has been blurred because f2.0 didn't offer enough DOF but I was afraid it wouldn't have come out, in the second I bokeh'd the first miniature and focused on the one in the foreground, even it was from the rear, but the film captured ALL the tiny details at 1/30s...I like these shots.

Ok that's the end of this little "BW00CN Eulogy", this is the state of the art of films today, do we really need digital cameras with 1 megamilions of megapixels and sharpening software?

However...you will be missed, old friend!

[edmundrt]

the fabulous (for me) BW400CN

BW400CN doesn't get the credit it deserves. Its grain characteristics are brilliant and it kicks XP2 into the weeds every time. I have one roll left and I'm saving it for a special occasion. After that I'll be trying Neopan 400CN and seeing how it compares.
Here's one of mine - BW400CN, ME Super, M50/1.7 and a Hoya close up filter, either +3 or +4. (pretty sure I posted this somewhere before)

[Cuthbert]

Good shot, very BW400CN like I assume.

In comparison this is the washed out look of the XP2, I used an Almaz 103 with Helios 44k lens...of course I was trying to instigate the swirly bokeh:



With the BW400CN I would have enjoyed more shades of grey, pretty sure about that.

[tuco]

If you send your film out to a lab, you hardly have full control over your images at all. The oldest saying in the book is meter for the shadows and develop for the highlights. And a lab pretty much can push film easy enough but compression and expansion is going to require an intimate working relationship with the lab to get that done.

[Nesster]

Tri-X in the KX, in D76. SMC-M 50/1.4 lens. Pretty plain vanilla, yes? However, I bought some metal reels and tanks for the first time ever (going back to '72) and attempted to load said Tri-X on said Honeywell Nikor reel. Partial success.





I lost about 1/3 of the roll from improper loading.

[45 Mike]

Ilford Grade #3 enlarging paper. scanned as transparency, B/W negative. ISO 8 500 watt fluorescent photo bulb from 12 " measured about 4 foot candles. 2 second exposure and F:8 diaphragm.

[stevebrot]

Rob, I don't even have an idea of what an "NR software" is

NR (noise reduction) software is something we don't use in film photography. The equivalent of sensor noise really does not exist. We do have grain, but it is from that grain that the image is built and it is not a good thing to get rid of it.


Steve

---------- Post added 12-01-14 at 05:20 PM ----------

However, I bought some metal reels and tanks for the first time ever (going back to '72) and attempted to load said Tri-X on said Honeywell Nikor reel. Partial success.

I have several Nikor reels, but all have suffered from the abuses of time and are difficult to load smoothly. I bought a couple of the superb Hewes reels from Freestyle and there was no looking back.


Steve

[Nesster]

I have several Nikor reels, but all have suffered from the abuses of time and are difficult to load smoothly. I bought a couple of the superb Hewes reels from Freestyle and there was no looking back.


Steve

Steve, I'm concluding I'm just not macho enough for these reels... though I will try again. The Nikor was new in box; the Kindermanns are used but in great shape. I doubt I'll be enough of a masochist to try 120 on metal reels.

[tuco]

Steve, I'm concluding I'm just not macho enough for these reels... though I will try again. The Nikor was new in box; the Kindermanns are used but in great shape. I doubt I'll be enough of a masochist to try 120 on metal reels.

Try cutting a 60° chamfer on the loading end of the film. I know it helps a lot with 120 roll film. But with the narrow width of 35mm film it might be a moot point.

[LaHo]

Some fairly recent shots from my Spotmatic F

A golf-playing astronaut and a bike. I liked the odd juxtaposition. Super-Takumar 85mm F1.9:


House number showing the fine tonal quality of Rollei RPX 400 film (dev. in ID-11 1+1). Super-Multi-Coated Takumar 200mm F4.0:


Old soldier relating gruesome tales from battles between Danish forces and Preussian soldiers in 1864. Well, not actually based on his personal recollections, as that was 150 years ago, but as a "re-enactment" soldier old war history is his main interest. Super-Takumar 85mm F1.9:


All images: Rollei RPX 400 developed in ID-11 1+1.