Creating Christmas lights with your camera, 4 examples

You may want to try this with Chirstmas lights, or any night scene with lights. It's a 10 or 15 second exposure on a tripod while hand zooming the lens from one end to the other during the exposure. You'll get a radiating pattern of lights with only the center not moving. Fill the frame with lights at the widest focal length. Put something interesting or the most light at the center. Or put everything off-center and get all lights radiating outward. Zoom slowly, filling the time with continuous zooming. I used the 7-14 mm lens but the 9-18 or the 11-22 could work equally well. You could use the 14-42 from 14 mm to about 22 mm. It might be easier to start at 22 mm and then zoom wider.

I learned this technique from Olympus Visionary Photographer, John Isaac at his seminar here in LA 5 years ago. He showed us one night shot with two children at the center and the street lights radiating behind them.

Lights, motion, long exposure and lens zoom. In the first 2 photos I put the moving subject off-center to get it moving across the frame. In photo #3 I aimed the 7-14 down and got the motion arcing in, down and then upward. Can you guess what these 3 scenes are?

Long exposure while zooming a wide angle lens. Guess where or what?

Long exposure, motion and zoom.

Long exposure, motion and zoom.

I shot the holiday lights below by using a long exposure with the 7-14 mm f/4 lens. I shot it with the Olympus E-3 at ISO 100, 15 seconds, and f/16 on a tripod and zoomed from 7 to 14 mm. I had to experiment just a little to find the right exposure. To get this affect I zoomed the lens from 7 mm to 14 mm by hand at a fairly steady rate over the exposure time. The camera was on a tripod. I should have used my cable release to trip the shutter but I left it at home. You can use the 2 second shutter delay, the remote IR trigger or a cable release. I suggest using a delayed shutter release and mirror lock up to give yourself time after pressing the shutter to get in position and hold the zoom ring steadily.

Blue Christmas lights shot about 3 or 4 years ago with the E-3

There are several more examples in my gallery here:

http://whaleshark.smugmug.com/Portraits/Christmas-Lights-and-Portraits/3936044_RmtW5g

--
Dave
No thought exists without an image. Socrates
http://whaleshark.smugmug.com