Fireworks primer

[Steve@C4]

Ok, I noticed that there are lots of fireworks shots and threads started. I thought I'd chime in on my approach to shooting them. Here's one of my shots from last night. Straight from the memory card with only a 1 stop push applied. No cropping either.

From Fireworks

Here was my approach.
1 - Make sure you have a fully charged battery. You'll be taking long time exposures and they are power hogs.

2 - Take a tripod and a weight for it. You want to make sure that your camera stays still. Along the same lines, a cable release is great but you can use your finger on the shutter release (I do). Just be real still!

3 - Seek the high ground and get there early. If you are familiar with the site, try to get a feel for how you'll frame your shots. I find that the shots are more interesting when they are grounded in reality (not just bursts in the air). Because of this, your first shots will be your most important. They are generally taken when there is some sort of light remaining.

4 - Set your camera on the lowest ISO setting you can and turn off any in camera noise reduction. If you keep the NR on, you'll double the processing time and be able to take many less photos.

5 - Try to time the shots. Wait till a large burst goes off. They are generally higher than the rest and can nicely frame other bursts. I usually set the exposure for 5 seconds and expose about 1/2 to 1 sec after the aforementioned large bursts.

6 - Pay attention to the wind. If the wind is blowing at you (or not blowing at all), your shots will start looking milky. If this happens switch to a telephoto and shoot some detail shots. The smoke will (in my opinion) become a part of the shot instead of a pain.

From Fireworks

From Fireworks

7 - Experiment. You really can't go wrong here.

You can click on the photos above to see all 60 of the shots I took last night. They are straight from the camera (flubs and all) You can get a feel for how I shot them by looking at the EXIFs (Photo Information)

Cheers,
Steve

[toyvlle]

Beautiful shots, I am really drawn to the first one. And thanks for the helpful hints, these helped me a lot when I tried shooting the fireworks. Thanks for sharing !

[Vinam]

very impressive Steve .. thanks very much for the awesome info and great examples.. I've already gathered from your post to slow down the speed and open up the shutter..I had no idea about the in camera NR , a great suggestion.

I get another crack at them next year.. thanks to you, I am nodding my head " ok, I see" .. long thin bright lines from the bursts is what I am missing and I need to capture a few seconds of the whole thing to get that . I really apprecaite your help and will be more informed for next time !!

wonderful post and great images,, thanks very much,

Vin

[Steve@C4]

Thanks for the encouragement. I looked at your shots as well and they look very good.

Keep on shootin'

Cheers,
Steve