Finding the Light in Night Photography

My husband and I were in the Australian Outback, watching a night presentation of Aboriginal cultural dances and ceremonies that began with sounds from the digeriedoo.  We were sitting up high and back a little from the presentation, which allowed me to view the whole scene and think about the light.  Flash photography here was out of the question.  Besides being ineffective because of the distance, the flash would have disturbed everyone else present.

Fortunately, the spotlight was on the presentation.  I turned off the flash, found the ISO settings – those control the light sensitivity of the digital flash card –  and set it for a high sensitivity level,  pushed my telephoto out to the maximum to get the reading and frame the shot, and went for it.

The light sensitivity reading was high enough to cause the camera to set a fast shutter speed.  That froze the action.  There was enough light on the people surrounding the presentation to give a good sense of what was going on.  The internal light meter in the camera read the light on the demonstration, so that stood out.

In order to do this, you need to find three topics in your camera manual and learn how to use them:  the icon settings – chosing one that will give you a fast shutter speed, such as sports or portrait, the telephoto controls, and the ISO controls in the menu options.  Those three options will allow you to take control of your camera.