Double exposure of Christmas Tree

[Steven Ruttenberg]

After seeing Steve Sherman's image of the Colt .45 pistols, I got to thinking about doing a double exposure of my Christmas Tree. First exposure all lights off in house, turn on tree lights, meter off lights and brighten by 1 stop. Turn lights off on tree, turn lights on in house, meter on tree, no adjustment, take second image.

Anything I am missing?

[Vaughn]

Sounds good to me. Alter the two exposures to change the mood.

[Steven Ruttenberg]

Cool. Hope to try it out this weekend.

[Steven Ruttenberg]

Any thoughts on doing this with Neon signs at night? Or night scenes with point light sources? I suppose I could do some dodging while making the exposure.

[Vaughn]

Outdoors it is often a matter of balancing the fading daylight with the lights -- tons of tutorials on YouTube

[Steven Ruttenberg]

The hardest is a neon sign at night, with surrounding details. Too much exposure get the foggy glow from the neon, but get good details elsewhere, not enough, neon sign looks good, details elsewhere are just black. Can't exactly tell the sign owner to turn sign off for 20-40 minutes at night so you can get a good image of the surrounding details. :)