Focusing at Night

[Sterling]

Last night I went out to get some night shots and had a really tough time focusing in the dark. I did the best I could with the viewfinder but for a number of shots I just stopped down the aperture and manually tried a few different focus points (I didn't even bother trying the AF; I didn't think it would work at all in that low light). Some worked and some didn't. Does anyone have any tips about improving my focusing efficiency and accuracy? It gets pretty chilly at -18C taking 30-60 second exposures + 30-60 seconds for noise reduction numerous times just to get one focused shot. Here is one of my shots from last night:

Exposure: 15
Aperture: f/11.0
Focal Length: 18 mm
ISO Speed: 200

[teaking]

Ermmm.... high F stop and focus on infinity? no idea if that one would work to be honest.

Other ways im not sure if you have tried, if you know the rough distance try dialing it in and again use a larger f stop something like F22 but that would increase the time to expose your shot... so maybe not a great way, or take a torch shine it at something with straight lines and point your camera and then get an A lock.

Hopefuly there will be some better ideas lol

[Sterling]

if you know the rough distance try dialing it in...

That would seem the reasonable course. However, neither of my lenses (18-105 and 35mm prime) have distance scales on them...

Does anybody ever mark their unmarked lenses?

Stopping down to f22 will increase the odds in landscape shots like above. But, if I tried to capture a close foreground object using a reduced depth of field, it would really be hit and miss.

[natek313]

Perhaps bringing a flash light along with you to light up the subject a bit so you can focus before hitting the shutter would work.

[Sterling]

Originally Posted by natek313

Perhaps bringing a flash light along with you to light up the subject a bit so you can focus before hitting the shutter would work.

Yes, maybe that's what I'll have to do. More stuff to carry.

[dcclark]

I frequently do the following for my night shots, in line with the above:

1. Compose
2. With the camera in AF mode, shine a bright flashlight (I use a heavy-duty LED light) on your subject
3. Let the camera autofocus
4. Turn the camera into manual focus mode
5. Shoot!

It helps if your subject is close enough to easily light up. If not, hilight something closer, and stop down a bit.

[nathanbarlow]

if you have no distance scales, I would say either high f value and focus to infinity, OR bring flashlight. If you get the head mounted ones (like for caving) you have handsfree...

[djb28]

I wear a head lamp. Not a big old miner lamp. One like this. It is light and gives off great lighting. Attaches to my baseball cap and lets me hand free focus!

[wanelad]

Firstly nice photo would do well as a Christmas card, Nth star leading the 3 wise men

I have always just used manual focus however a bit tricky as my eye sight is not what it use to be. Great suggestions with the torch, will have to try that one if the subjects close enough although most of the time the pictures i take are at a distance

[availablelight]

A common enough problem... The way I deal with this is to consider two things. The distance my "main" subject is away from me, and secondly, the distance the closest important foreground element. It is a good idea to get a hyperfocal distance calculator. In the shot you posted above, you could have shot at f4 with the same DOF. Any of the bright lights in the BG could have been used as a focus point. Anything from those trees to the moon at f4 is more of less at infinity. In most scenarios I'll AF on the moon or a bright star and then adjust the aperture for my DOF requirements. I don't get any OOF foregrounds and almost never shoot over f5.6 at night.

This may be useful:

Night Light

Happy New Year...