New Years Fireworks? Film? Settings? Suggestions? Tips?

[l2oBiN]

I am planing to try an capture the new years fireworks in Stockholm. At my disposal is some velvia and portra 160. I never shot portra but was thinking it might be the better choice for potential exposure errors of unpredictable forewords lighting?

Having newer shot fireworks before, It would be great if you could offer some tips, tricks exposure settings for best capture. The aim is to have a nice uninterrupted view of the city (eg from a 5-6th floor of a building) with the fireworks incorporated...

I think I will only get one chance at it do it has to work the first time...


Cheers,

Marko

[Greg Lockrey]

If it's night.... I'd use f/11 for 30-60 seconds to let the bursts run their course. Longer if you want more bursts. Point the camera over the horizon to exclude as much ambient light as possible.

[vinny]

I've shot fireworks at f11 with velvia but left the shutter open for the duration of the fireworks which was 30 minutes. This was a small show, I would have liked more exposure in the sky but the results were great.

[Jim Jones]

Including city lights complicates the shoot. The Jim Jones formula for Kodachrome and Ektachrome was to set the aperture to the square root of the ISO, and leave the shutter open for one or more complete bursts. Color negatives might tolerate more exposure, and B&W certainly does. These exposures usually blow out any artificial lighting in the foreground. That can be reduced by dodging out the foreground during most of the exposure.

[Frank Petronio]

Use any type of ISO 100 to 400 color negative film, set lens at f/11-16 and leave the shutter open for about a minute or two and you will get something usable. It is impossible to fine tune since you will never know where, how many, how bright they will be.

Don't freeze!

[Robert Hughes]

Wait a minnit! That photo's not in color. You trying to pull something over on us?

[Gary Tarbert]

Hi, Only Shot fireworks a couple of times i found the exsposure for the city lights and fireworks not that far apart some brighter some not so, But since all our good skyshows use the Perth lights as a backdrop it was a good place to start, 20-40secs seemed the best @f11assuming 100 iso Some friends of mine at a new years eve bash were heading to the hills too shoot the fireworks and asked if they would need a tripod!!, These new age digital shooters they expect miracles (ie 100 iso noise or grain at 6400 iso setting), When i said absolutely ! They decided maybe they didn't want to make photo's afterall Cheers gary

[l2oBiN]

Thank you all for your insightful suggestions. Unfortunatelly I did not manage to capture the image. Too many unexpected crowds at the best lookout spot in town.. It was wishful thinking after all...

[Ben Syverson]

Compelling argument for keeping a Gorillapod in your camera bag at all times... Like an umbrella, you don't need it until you do. BTW, the "SLR-Zoom" Gorillapod supports a Graflex field camera very well.