Twilight City Shoots

7/27/2019 Twilight City Shoots

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ead into the city just after sunset to capture colourful andmospheric shots of illuminated buildings and landmarks

Shoot a c tyscene at twilight

t you’ll needod • ND filter • Remotee • Photoshop Elements

long it’ll takeday

skills you’ll learnw to compose and focushot using Live Vieww to use a neutral density

er to capture long exposuresw to use Elements’ Gradientl to add colour to the sky

ecklist F or great cityscapes you can’t beat

shooting at twilight: after the sun

has set, but before the darkness

falls, there’s still enough natural light

to bring out detail, while the city lights

will be coming on to create extra colour

and interest. Twilight doesn’t last long

though, so you’ll need to be in position

and set up before the sun sets.

For our shoot we headed into the

heart of London to photograph St Paul’s

Cathedral and the Millennium Bridge

from the Thames Embankment; for a

successful twilight cityscape you need

to include iconic or interesting buildings

or bridges that are illuminated at night.

You’ll need a tripod, and optionally an

ND filter to stop down the light so you

can shoot long exposures. Aside from

enabling you to blur water and skies,

long exposures have another use: if

cars or people are passing through your

scene and the exposure is long enough,

they won’t appear in the image – you’ll

need a shutter speed of between 15 to

30 seconds to achieve this.



Timing and locationTo make the most of the twilight period you need

to be set up ready to shoot in good time, so check

the sunset time – twilight begins after the sun sets, and

before the darkness sets in. Choose a location with

buildings that have plenty of lights and illuminated

windows, and other interesting features.

Use a tripodSet your camera up on a tripod so that you can

capture long exposures. Make sure you place it

out of the way of people passing by, as you don’t want

it to get knocked during an exposure. If it’s windy you’ll

need to shelter it – you can do this with your body, or

weigh down the centre column with your camera bag

if it has a hook for this purpose.

Camera settingsSet your camera to Av mode and set the aperture

to f/16 – combined with the long exposure thiswill produce a ‘starburst’ effect from the lights in the

scene. Noise can be a problem with long exposures in

low light, so keep the ISO to 100 to counter this, and

shoot Raw files for maximum quality.

ND filterTo obtain a slow enough shutter speed to blur

water and clouds you’ll need a neutral density

(ND) filter. We used a variable ND, which enabled us

to control the strength of the effect by rotating the

outermost filter. Half-press the shutter button to take

a shutter speed reading – around 30 secs is ideal.

Composition and focusSwitch to Live View mode to compose and focus

the shot (this also means the mirror will be locke

up to minimise camera vibrations). Compose the shot

using leading lines such as a bridge or river to draw the

eye into the scene. To focus, switch your lens to

manual, then zoom in on a key feature (St Paul’s in our

case) and adjust the focus to get it perfectly sharp.

Remote releaseUse a remote release to fire the shutter so that

you don’t jog the camera at the start of theexposure (if you don’t have one, you can use the 2-sec

Self-timer option in the AF/Drive settings). Make sure

you don’t touch the camera during the exposure, and

check your image is sharp when you’ve taken it.

fractionraction is a

enomenon where

t ‘bends’ around

all obstacles, such

he aperture blades

lens – the narrower

aperture, the more

nounced the effect.usually regarded as

roblem, as it leads

a loss of overall

arpness in an image.

wever, it can be

ed creatively to your

vantage, with light

urces taking on an

ractive ‘starburst’

ect; small street

ts in a scene are

ticularly prone to

effect. You’ll need

hoot at a narrow

erture, such as f/16;

ou shoot at wide

ertures of around

6 you won’t be able

capture the effect.

hrase Book

The rule of

thirds is just as

portant when you’re

mposing cityscapes

or landscapes: for

shot we filled the

and bottom thirds

he frame with the

and water, and

ced the dome of St

ul’s on the left-hand

tical third line; we

o used the diagonals of the bridge

ead the eye

o the scene.

uper Tip!

man

case



R editsOpen cityscape_start.dng. Set the Temperature

slider to 7650 to warm the image up, then set

osure to +0.95 to brighten the shot. Set Highlights

0 to pull back some of the overexposed highlights,

set Shadows to +60 to add some ‘fill light’ to the

er areas. Set Contrast to +30, Clarity to +35 and

ration to +10.

op and straightenClick and hold on the Crop tool icon in the toolbar

and choose the 2 to 3 ratio, then crop the image

se the fence at the bottom and tidy up the edges.

select the Straighten tool and draw a line along

op of the river wall, then click Enter to crop and

ghten the image. Click Open Image to open the

ge in Elements’ Expert/Full Edit workspace.

Draw a gradientSelect the Gradient tool. In the Options panel

click the Edit button and choose the Foreground

to Transparent option, then click the Linear Gradient

button and check Transparency. Draw a short gradient

from the top of the dome of St Paul’s to the tops of the

buildings below, then change the layer’s blending mode

to Overlay to blend the gradient in. To fine-tune the

contrast add a Levels adjustment layer, and set the

Shadows slider to 8 and Midtones to 1.05.

mple a sky colourWe’ll use a gradient to enhance the top part of the

sky. Add a new layer, then click the foregroundur swatch in the Tools panel to open the Color

er. Move your cursor over the sky – it’ll change to

yedropper – and click to sample a dark blue tone,

click the circle in the colour field and drag it right

down to select a darker and more saturated blue.

Other examples...Cities at twilight present you with lots of creativeoptions – here are two more effects to try out

Sweeping city skylines are prime candidates for panoramic images, and we

cropped this image to the 16:9 ratio to create a panoramic composition. You can

create wider panoramas by shooting several images and merging them using

Elements’ Photomerge Panorama command – for the best results shoot in

portrait orientation, leaving plenty of overlap between shots.

You can bring your

city scenes to life by

using a slow shutter

speed to create the

impression of bustling

movement. For the

best results you’ll

need an exposureof between 1 and 5

seconds – for this

shot we chose 2.5

secs at f/10.

Overlay modeOverlay blending mode

is a combination of

Multiply mode, which

darkens pixels, and

Screen mode, which

lightens pixels. Overlay

applies a Multiplyeffect if pixels on the

lower layer are darker

than 50% grey, and a

Screen effect if pixels

are lighter than 50%

grey; in this case it

darkens the dark tones

in the sky but lightens

the lighter colours of

the sky and dome,

boosting the contrast.

Phrase Book

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Twilight City Shoots