Some trips are memorable and some trips are unforgettable. I have been to the New York city quite a few times and each time with a different purpose. Sometimes I go there to visit my friends, sometimes just for the restaurant hopping, sometimes for a work related activities and sometimes I go there just for the shooting. But the last trip was a combination of all and probably the last one of its kind in many ways. It was a fun trip with an emotionally drenched ending. If you skim through my photo gallery, you would quickly notice that I love to take night cityscapes and have been to NYC few times just for those night cityscapes. Usually, I would like to take such trips alone so that I could get out and go for the shoot wherever I want and whenever I want. But occasionally, I would get a company and trips would bring different dimensions of me as a photographer and as a person in general. Having an extra pair of eyes and creative mind is always helpful. When I do these night cityscapes, I always go through my checklist of things to do for the long exposure shots and works most of the time. Here is the shot from the trip.

Tin (Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam) asked: Your gallery has some really amazing long exposure night shots. I am also interested in taking such photos. How should I prepare myself for the long exposure shots?

If you want to take long exposure shots, there are few requirements in terms of accessories you might need and the camera settings you need to setup. And if you are just starting, you can start with a minimal setup and as you grow more with your experience, you would find out what else you might need to improve your skill. This is what I would suggest to anyone who is starting into any genre of photography; start with the basics, you would make mistakes, learn from those mistakes and keep practicing. This is coming from my personal experience.

Now, to answer your question about the requirements for the long exposure shots, let's talk about the accessories you might need in the first section and then I will go through the camera settings in the following section.

1. Accessories you would need for the Long Exposure shots

- Tripod

Tripod is a must have device when you are taking long exposure shots. The general rule of thumb is: if you are shooting with a shutter speed that is slower than the focal length value, you would need a tripod to get the sharper image. Let’s say you are shooting at the focal length of 80mm, any shutter speed that is less than 1/80th of a second requires a tripod to produce a crisp image. I think it pays to invest in a good tripod (carbon fiber if you can afford) so that you won't have to keep replacing the tripod with every new camera you would buy in the future. I suggest you to get the one that can support heaviest camera-lens combo in the market and have extra features like panning support and easy movement of the camera in all possible directions. I think finding the best tripod requires a little bit of research of your own based on your budget and future plannings.

I have forever enjoyed travelling to new city with my camera and indulging in adventurous night photography (secret to my adrenaline rush). Pittsburgh is a beautiful city located just three and a half hour drive from where I live, and I shamefully admit that I had not made it to this city in the past 10 years. It was only last year when the opportunity came up to attend a cybersecurity training program in the city of Steelers. I was very excited for soon I would be doing everything that I love doing. As an IT professional, I was thrilled about the training program but silently I was ecstatic about traveling to a new city and doing night photography. I like to be prepared when I travel to a new place and get my itinerary ready beforehand. Along with some homework I did, I also got a little help from the Uber drivers to pick possible locations for the night shoot, which worked out perfectly for my photography adventure.

Pittsburgh is known as the city of the steelworkers where the United States Steel Corporation's 64-story tall headquarter is located. The famous football team Steelers also got their name from this steel town and the history of it’s steel workers. Sadly, the steel corporation does not own the building anymore but they are still one of the largest tenants in the building. The city lost most of the steel workers due to the change in global economy market.

I chose to drive to the city instead of flying. I entered the city through a tunnel and as I came out on the other end, I was amazed by this view of Pittsburgh’s skyscrapers and bridges. I could not believe that it took me so many years to visit this beautiful city surrounded by the hills. As soon as I checked into the hotel, I went out for an evening stroll around the downtown. Surprisingly, the downtown was pretty quiet and not much was going on (I thought it was a MONDAY to blame!). Then I tried going to a few shops and restaurants and they were all closed or getting ready to close. After walking around for a while, I found one restaurant which happen to open late on Monday nights. It was quite an experience for me on the very first day. Nothing goes down before midnight in DC downtown and here I was in Pittsburgh at 9 pm trying to look for an open restaurant. When I came back and asked the hotel staff about the minimal activity in the city, he said that's how it's always been around the downtown. All the restaurants and small businesses depend on the corporate employees and closes early right after the office hour.

In the era of digital photography, we can't overlook the idea of data backup. I am working as an IT professional for over 12 years now and I couldn't emphasize more on the importance of data backup. In my professional career, I implement multiple layers of backups and disaster recovery systems to protect the company data. The data we work with and the storing methods for those data have changed a lot over the years. We used to deal with Megabytes and Gigabytes of data, which have now changed to Terabytes and Petabytes. High resolution images, 4K and Ultra 4K HD videos are becoming normal with the increasing popularity of smartphones and advanced cameras. These high quality files are helping us to be more creative but managing them is becoming a problem.

Back in the days of film photography, we could only take a certain number of pictures per roll. Also, we would have to keep the negative as a backup for the future production. But digital photography has changed the way we take pictures and the way we store them. We can now take unlimited number of pictures without ever getting worried about the space on the camera memory. Even if the memory is full, we can download them on a computer within a few minutes and make it available for the shooting immediately. Given the number of files we capture during one shooting, I think its time to think about the proper backup solution so that we don’t lose the pictures because of the memory crash or the computer hard-disk failure. If you are working on time sensitive projects, the worst thing that can happen is lose all of the photographs that you have taken for the clients because of the electronics malfunction. Now, you may argue that even our backup device or the service may fail and we may lose the data. In short, yes it can happen, but, having a multiple backups is obviously a better idea than storing your pictures on a single memory card or rely on your computer hard-disk only. The chances of failing multiple devices at the same time are very very low, and also, there are few strategies you can implement to decrease that chance to virtually zero.

Almost all consumer level DSLRs and some of the pro level DSLRs come with the built-in flash. Professional photographers who shoot wedding, fashion, commercial portrait, or other special events do not rely on built-in flash to illuminate their subject. But, you don't have to use flash only when there is not sufficient natural light. It can also be used as a fill light to remove shadows or to add a catch light to the subject's eye. One of the best thing about the built-in flash is, you don't have to carry around an extra equipment and is always available on your camera, as long as the camera has sufficient battery power to charge and fire the flash. It can be put to use instantly whenever you want and doesn’t require any sophisticated setup. However, you need to understand few basics settings of your camera and should be comfortable navigating through the menu settings and the buttons on the camera.

Use of camera's built-in flash and its effect on the picture is determined by various settings on the camera, but most importantly, which metering mode you are currently using and what exposure mode you are on play a bigger role. Let's recap these camera metering modes briefly and then we can discuss about the steps we would be following in order to use on-camera flash. Since I wrote the blog about camera metering (in more detail) almost 9 years ago, Nikon has added a new metering mode; Highlight-Weighted Metering, which we will be discussing in the section below.

If you have to carry only one lens, which lens would you choose? After purchasing a DSLR, it can be an overwhelming experience to select the right lens for the camera, specially if it is your first time purchase. There are so many camera brands to select from and they all have their own set of lenses. My first DSLR, Nikon D60, came with the kit lenses (18-55mm and 55-200mm) which removed my confusion on lens selection. Since then, I have owned two DX format DSLRs, two FX format DSLRs and various lenses from Nikon. Even though my first lenses were not my choice, it worked pretty well for me in all kinds of shooting scenarios. Later, when I upgraded my camera to D90, I bought it in a combo package which came with a 18-200mm lens along with other accessories including the memory card and the cleaning kit. Later, I sold all of my lenses and purchased a 18-300mm lens. All of these lenses are designed for different purposes and different shooting environments. Some of them are designed for all purpose shooting, some of them are for indoor shooting only and others are designed to reach long distance subjects. Some of the lenses are heavier and hard to carry around all day and some of them are light weight and made for traveling purposes. It’s hard to cover all of them in one blog post, but today, I am going to discuss one particular lens that might be an ideal for traveling purpose and specially if you want to carry only one lens that covers the variety of ranges.

When I purchased 18-300mm, I got AF-S DX Nikkor 18-300mm f/3.5-5.6 G ED VR lens which seems to be discontinued now and replaced by the newer model, AF-S DX Nikkor 18-300mm f/3.5-6.3 G ED VR, which I am going to discuss in today’s post. Let me briefly summarize the technical details and then we can go to the practical aspects of the lens.

Being a local, I can vouch that spring is the best time to visit Washington DC. Just when locals bid goodbye to the long brutal winter, tourists pour into the city from all around the world to see the arrival of spring in the nation’s capital. Approximately 3,000 cherry trees around the tidal basin area go to their full bloom during this time of the year. These trees were presented as a gift from the Mayor of Tokyo to the city of Washington DC in 1912 as a symbol to celebrate the friendship between Japan and America. In DC metro area, the arrival of spring is celebrated with the Cherry Blossom Festival which is a month long program that involves various outdoor activities including the marching band parades, music, showmanship and many other events. These pink and white cherry blooms look so amazingly beautiful, they leave the viewers wonderstruck. Above all, this festival is a stunning opportunity for photography enthusiasts from across the country and all around the world.

During the peak bloom period, it can be a real struggle to find a good spot to photograph without getting tourists or other fellow photographers in the frame. Last year, I reached the tidal basin area at around 6:30 AM and quickly realized that I was late. Because of the crowd, I was not able to take a single photo the way I had imagined. On the good side, I was able to put aside my camera and enjoy the beautiful scenery of the cherry blossoms. Learning from my past experience, I decided to go little earlier this year but still bumped into few tourists and a couple of photographers who came to photograph the sunrise. While people were waiting for the sunrise, I was setting up the camera on the tripod and getting ready for the blue hour shots. It was a cold and a windy morning, and taking a long exposure shot for the blue hour was a challenging task without getting part of the image blurred. After finding a proper composition, I took a few shots but it all came out blurry because of the swinging tree branches. I patiently waited for the wind to stop and managed to get one good shot. The picture below was taken at aperture value of f/11, exposure time of 25 seconds, ISO 64 and focal length of 22mm using the Nikon D810 body and the Nikkor 16-35mm f/4G lens.

Panning is the technique which shows the motion of the subject, if done correctly. It involves the movement of the camera along with the moving subject either in horizontal or vertical direction. When we think of horizontal panning, we can think of situations like traffic on the road, racing games, sprinters or cyclists, whereas panning to capture the motion of a diver is an example of vertical panning. Theoretically, panning is a simple technique which requires you to use the slower shutter speed, maintain the focus on the subject, continuously pan with the subject and then take the shot. But getting a perfect panning shot is not as simple as it sounds. It needs precise focusing on the subject, good timing on releasing the shutter, balancing your distance with the subject and keep practicing with the different shutter speed until you get the balanced result.

Panning is an interesting concept where the motion is shown by freezing the movement of the subject while making the background blurry at the same time. We all know that freezing the moving subject requires faster shutter speed, but to make the part of the image blurry, we need to shoot with the slower shutter speed. If that is the case, you can possibly argue that how can we achieve the desired shot without combining multiple images, right? And that is the secret of this technique. You don’t have to edit the picture or combine shots in order to get the motion effect in a single picture. You would get it by properly applying the techniques, and timing the shot from the proper distance so that you could include the background in the frame, which is very important to get the motion effect. Now let’s get into the details of these techniques and see how can we master the panning shots.

I primarily shoot landscape and cityscape which requires me to take a long exposure and bracketed shots. Even though there is no hard-and-fast rule, there are few generally accepted practices among the photography communities for the camera controls and the settings, camera and the lens types and the list of accessories one should have to get better results. Usually, combining a full frame (FX-Format) camera with the wide angle lens gives you the best possible frame for the landscape or the cityscape shots. If you shoot with a higher resolution DSLR, you can crop the images, change the composition during the post-processing and still have enough pixels left in them to print in a larger size. If you are more interested in shooting buildings and architectures, you would get better results by using the tilt-shift lens which allows you to move (tilt and shift) the part of the lens in relation to the image sensor in a wide range of directions and gives you the better and more natural perspective of the structure.

Since I stepped into the photography world in 2009, Nikon D810 is my fourth DSLR but second full frame camera after D700. The decision to upgrade D700 to D810 was influenced by the need for a moderately higher resolution camera which was designed and marketed for landscape photography. Over the last 10 years, I have tried and shot in different camera settings and lighting environments. I have traveled to many places to get a good shot and also made countless mistakes repeatedly. I have learned the most from my own mistakes which gave me some invaluable lessons about what to do and what not to do during the shooting process. All these years of mistakes and countless teaching moments gave me my own set of camera controls and the settings to follow. Today, I want to share that information with you and get your feedback if you have any.

When I started my journey in digital photography ten years ago, I didn't have much interest in post processing. I was more focused on learning photography techniques, know more about the camera controls and the settings and get familiar with the gears, lights and other accessories. As I started gaining more experience with the camera setup and the gears, I felt more comfortable with the technical aspects of the shooting. Slowly, I started learning about the composition technique and used my technical skills to capture the image on various situations. The more I shoot, the more I felt that the camera was not able to capture all the colors I see through the lens. This is when I started to explore the possibility of introducing post-processing tool in my digital photography career. When I was shopping around for my first full frame but third DSLR, Nikon D700, I got introduced to Nikon’s own post-processing tool, Capture NX2, and without putting too much thought into it, I started using it. Since it was my first experience with any kind of post-processing tool, there was a steep learning curve for me but I enjoyed the process. After I started using Capture NX2 for a while, I felt like I was missing a big part of digital photography by overlooking the editing process in my early days of photography. Within a couple of months of using the software, I realized that, when post-processing is applied carefully and skillfully, it can completely change the look and feel of the picture and make it more alive again. But, suddenly, when I was just getting the hang of it, Nikon decided to discontinue the Capture NX2 software and stopped releasing the future updates and the support for the new cameras. I was still able to use the software (to process RAW files from my D700) for a couple of years even after their announcement but it became completely useless when I upgraded my D700 to D810 in 2017.

I had no choice but look for the alternatives which would support the RAW files from the Nikon D810. After doing much research, I decided to go with Adobe Lightroom. It's been little over a year since I started using the Lightroom and I couldn't be more happier. It is lightweight and very powerful program which works well with the varieties of RAW files. When I download the pictures on the computer, I import the RAW (NEF format) files directly into the Lightroom library and edit them when I want to. Besides Lightroom, I don't use any other tool to process my pictures. In terms of editing the picture, what I can do with the Lightroom, I could also do with the Capture NX2 but the process was complex and time consuming. In my experience, I found Lightroom to be much faster compared to the Capture NX2 and provides various powerful tools to edit the pictures with much more ease than it’s competitors. All of the edits done inside the Lightroom are non-destructible, which means Lightroom doesn't modify the original RAW file but only adds the instructions on the file based on what settings were applied during the development of the picture and renders the image by layering up those instructions step by step. You can always go back to the previous steps and undo the changes you made in those steps. However, Lightroom being a linear program, what you can not do is; you can not undo or erase one particular step in the middle and keep rest of the edits intact. For example, after applying 10 steps of editing (changing any one setting is one step of editing), you can’t undo only the 7th step and preserve the changes made in 8th, 9th and 10th steps. If you do so, it will delete everything from the 7th step up-to the 10th step and you have to progress the future editing from the 7th step again.