7

CHAPTER
NIGHT AND LOW-LIGHT PHOTOGRAPHY / The Nighttime Sky

subject moves enough during the time frame to

keep it interesting. It’s no fun watching a movie

where nothing happens, and the same is true for

time-lapse movies.

There are many fantastic time-lapse movies done

of the Milky Way, star trails, and other great

nighttime subjects, but before venturing out into

the desert to make your time-lapse masterpiece,

study the basics and do some tests closer to home.

One subject that makes for an interesting shoot is

the sunrise or sunset, not only because it can be

really fun to watch, but also because it brings up

some important exposure and white balance con-

siderations.

When you combine the images into a movie, it

really works best if the white balance for all the

images is the same. By setting the white balance

to an actual numerical value and not the auto

white balance, you will ensure that the entire

movie has a consistent look, and you won’t get

color shifts between each frame. When you use

the auto white balance, the camera looks at the

color of the light and tries to determine the white

balance; it usually does a great job, but the prob-

lem arises because, as the sun moves, the temper-

ature of the light changes and that change causes

the auto white balance to change as it tries to

correctly read the light illuminating the scene.

Usually I do not worry about the white balance

very much because I generally shoot RAW files

and can easily adjust the color in postproduction;

however, for time-lapse photography, there can

be thousands of images and so I never shoot them

in RAW. This is one type of photography where

RAW files are not a good option because they are

just way too big for what’s needed. You can

change the size of the file as you are creating the

movie, but if the final product is to be a movie,

then there is no reason to record the giant RAW

files in the first place. This also allows you to get

The gear you need

There are two pieces of equipment needed to take
time-lapse photography: a tripod and a remote
that allows you to set the number of shots and
the interval between them automatically. Some
cameras have this functionality built right in, so
before buying anything, check your camera man-
ual. For the time lapse to work, the camera needs
to be stationary, which means using a tripod.

The remote that triggers the shutter release needs
to be able to fire the camera on a set schedule
with a programmable interval between the photo-
graphs; this remote is usually called an interval-
ometer. For example, the Nikon MC-36
multi-function remote cord allows you to set the
shutter time as well as the interval and the num-
ber of shots, thus allowing for an easy setup for
time-lapse photography. The Canon TC-80N3
camera remote control cable allows you to set the
interval easily with a thumb dial. These remotes
are not cheap, with the Nikon costing about $130
and the Canon costing about $150, but if you
want to do this type of photography, then you
will need to get a remote, as doing this manually
is difficult. Another option is the Triggertrap
(www.triggertrap.com) that can be used for time-
lapse photography.

Picking the right subject and settings

One of the keys to a successful time-lapse photo
shoot is picking a good subject and the best length
of time to shoot that subject. For example, if you
want to do a time lapse of a sunset, then the time
of the shoot needs to be from 30 minutes to a few
hours at the most. However, if, for example, you
want to show a building under construction, then
the time frame might be a month or even a year.
The key to an effective time lapse is that the