Oxford School of Photography

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Tag Archives: nightphotography

What You Need to Know About Night Photography

From the pages of Lighstalking another great article By . Now the days are at their longest you can be out shooting those lovely dusk images right up until bedtime…..

“Night photography can be split into to distinct timeframes, the hour just after sunset, l’Heure Blue as the French call it, which translates as the Blue Hour and the time after, the night proper. The two need slightly different approaches and can give very different results.”

2009-09-23 Dubrovnik-025
Old Dubrovnik during the Blue Hour

“Tips for Shooting in the Blue Hour

l’Heure Blue is in many ways perfectly described, it is the time after the sun goes down when the sky and the shadows become a dark rich blue. The first thing you need to do is pick your subject carefully, by its very nature the Blue Hour still leaves a little ambient light mixed in with the artificial light. Architecture, bridges and other large infrastructure subjects are good things to shoot at this time. Look for a subject that is well lit with artificial light as well having enough space around to show some of the detail in the sky. It is that combination of the rich blue with the orange, red and yellow of the artificial light that makes these images so potent.”