Night Photography Tips

...What are our tools in night photography?

Tripod. While not always necessary (see further on for how to cheat on this), a tripod will give you the greatest flexibility to get the angles you need while keeping your camera steady for those long exposures.

Wide-angle lenses. This is a personal preference, but I love the way they work in night photography. I use Canon’s 10-22mm f/3.5-4.5 ($700), but if you can afford it I’d get the Canon 16-35mm f/2.8L II ($1300). If both of these are out of your price range – don’t worry! Try it out with whatever you’ve got as the only thing that will limit you is your imagination.

A lens hood. To minimize lens flares from light entering at angles outside of your frame.

A flashlight. Sometimes you’ll want to draw attention to or simply lighten up an important part of the foreground which is too dark.

Our imagination. Tools lie all around us in everyday objects to help us make our work better in this; I’ve used bicycle lamps, lampposts and newspaper boxes to get it ...