Special tricks for night shots, spooky pumpkins, and scary costumes.
Dave Johnson
PC World
Wednesday, October 12, 2005
12:10 AM
It's that time of year again--when kids don scary costumes and run through the streets in search of candy. It may not sound like much of a holiday, but Halloween has been celebrated like this for more than a hundred years. This year, why not take some spooky pictures of the event? Let's talk about how to do it.
The heart and soul of most Halloween photos is that creepy, yellowish glow caused by flashlights and candles in the dark. So to really capture the essence of Halloween, be sure to turn off your camera's flash and shoot just with natural light.
As you can probably guess, night photography guidelines apply here. Your shutter speed will probably be pretty slow, so you'll get better results if you can mount the camera on a tripod or brace yourself against a door frame or some other support. It's okay to leave the camera in automatic exposure mode, but to minimize the length of time that the shutter is open, you might want to increase the camera's ISO setting so it can capture light more efficiently.
Those spooky pumpkins are the very epitome of Halloween. How do you get a great photo of one? As I already mentioned, take your picture in the dark, with the flash off. Let the candlelight inside the pumpkin provide most of the illumination.
But don't rely entirely on the candles inside, or the outside of your pumpkin will be in silhouette. To help illuminate the outside of the pumpkin, set up a few candles in front of it, so candlelight will provide more uniform illumination. You'll probably want to keep those outside candles out of the picture frame, though.
And here's a trick most people don't think about: If you're taking a picture of a jack-o-lantern, use more than one candle inside the pumpkin. Pack two or three of them into it to make the face glow more strongly.
Taking a picture of kids in costume? You can add a great glow to the trick-or-treaters if your camera lets you leave the shutter open for an extended period, such as 15 or 30 seconds, and if you have a tripod or some other secure support. Mount the camera on a tripod outdoors, in the dark, and frame your subject. Press the stutter release to start your long exposure. Then run behind the subjects and turn on a flashlight. Point the light towards the camera and trace the subjects from behind, as if you were outlining them with a giant paint brush.
If the scene is dark enough, you won't show up on film, but the light will add a cool yellowish glow all around the edges of the trick-or-treaters.
When you get your photos onto your PC to do some touch-up work, feel free to run some one-click fixes in your favorite image editor to tweak the brightness, contrast, and sharpness. But don't change the white balance: Your image editor will probably try to "fix" the color in the scene, which usually shifts the spooky yellowish glow to an ordinary white.
Dave's Favorites: Share Your Photos With Slide
Every day, it seems, I see a new photo sharing service. One that's distinctly different--and quite cool--is Slide . Launched recently, the free service lets you display your photos in a rolling filmstrip that scrolls slowly down the side of your computer screen. The pictures are small and unobtrusive. But if you hover over an image, the filmstrip pauses and the selected image appears in a larger window for closer inspection. From there, you can instantly share the picture with anyone via e-mail.
Slide allows you to organize your photos into "channels" and choose which channels to show on your desktop. You can also share channels with the world at large and subscribe to other people's channels as well. Some Web sites have already created their own channels. You can subscribe to Gizmodo.com's parade of gadget-related photos, for instance, or see your fill ofDilbertcartoons; go to Slide's Channel Guide to browse the selection.
Q#00026A: Are 8 Megapixels Really Better Than 6?
I'm shopping for a camera. How big is the difference in quality between 6.3 and 8.0 megapixels?
Actually, not all that much. Going from 6.3 to 8 megapixels is a fairly small jump in the total number of pixels in an image; it doesn't allow you to print billboard-sized photos, or anything stupendous like that.
Consider this: A standard 6.3-megapixel image measures 3072 by 2000, while an 8-megapixel image is 3264 by 2468. That's only an extra 300 or 400 pixels along each side of the picture, which translates into perhaps an extra inch--that's right, 1 inch--of printed picture.
And then there's the fact that manufacturers usually pack those extra pixels into the same-size camera sensor. Since all the pixels are closer together on the CCD, that means each pixel can't gather as much light and the whole sensor is potentially noisier.
Bottom line: Don't buy a camera based on megapixels alone. Read the reviews , and keep an eye out for the image quality ratings. That's what matters most.
Hot Pics
Get published, get famous! Each week, we select our favorite reader-submitted photo based on creativity, originality, and technique. Every month, the best of the weekly winners gets a prize valued at between $15 and $50.
Here's how to enter: Send us your photograph in JPEG format, at a resolution no higher than 640 by 480 pixels. Entries at higher resolutions will be immediately disqualified. If necessary, use an image editing program to reduce the file size of your image before e-mailing it to us. Include the title of your photo along with a short description and how you photographed it. Don't forget to send your name, e-mail address, and postal address. Before entering, please read the full description of the contest rules and regulations.
This Week's Hot Pic:" Foggy Sunrise ," by Michael Moran, Waupun, Wisconsin
About this week's photo, Michael says: "My normal route to work was under construction one morning, so I had to detour over some narrow, winding Wisconsin country roads. Fortunately I'm seldom without a camera, and this shot simply leapt into view as I rounded a curve. It was a matter of pure luck in timing; a minute later the sun would have been too bright and too high to be so nicely framed by the tree's branches. I used my Fuji S3000."
Hot Pic of the Month:Each month we choose one of our weekly winners to be the Hot Pic of the Month. For September, we chose " Flying Circle ," by Thornton T. Penrose from Loretto, Virginia.
Congratulations to Thornton and to everyone else who won a Hot Pic of the Week last month. Keep those entries coming!