dotPhoto Blog

The holiday season – photograph christmas lights

Capture the Holiday Season – Photograph Christmas Lights

If you’re anything like us here at dotPhoto you and your family members always take lots and lots of holiday photos. Most of the time our homes and families are the subjects and many of these photos are of the Christmas tree, opening presents and gathering around the dinner table. We wind up with many pictures that help us remember the gathering and the time we all shared.

In the few weeks before the family gathering we like to ride around town and look at all the decorations that folks put up. While we’re riding we stop to snap a few shots and then head home to sit around the table and look at them. We usually just take a leisurely ride and snap the photos without much thought. Some of the decorations we see are well done and could make great subjects for carefully taken photos. So this year I decided to get a little more particular and try to take photos that really capture the beauty and good feelings that these decorations give us. But before starting I decided to look into how expert photographers snap their outdoor holiday photos to get a few hints on techniques.

Here are three articles I discovered that focus on taking photos of holiday lighting decorations and these are what I mostly take photos of. I think these suggestions will definitely help me do much better this year…if I take my time preparing and shooting the photos.

Interestingly, the recommendations suggest taking some photos when there is still a bit of daylight. I hadn’t thought of that. The articles are all good and are presented here in the order I found them.

The first article by Noella Ballenger is entitled “Christmas Lights Photography – How To Capture The Season” and can be seen at http://www.apogeephoto.com/photographing-christmas-lights/. Noella offers some advice, on white balance, camera modes, shutter speeds and more. Here are two of her photos.

christmaslights1

christmaslights2

Our next article is entitled “How to Photograph Christmas Lights” and is written by the community at wikiHow. Here are two of their examples. They also offer eight suggestions for ways to take good Christmas light photos. See the article here, http://www.wikihow.com/Photograph-Christmas-Lights.

christmaslights3

christmaslights4

Our third article is entitled, “How to Take Great Photos of Holiday Lights”, and was created by the staff at the New York Institute of Photography. This article also offers good and easy to follow advice for snapping our holiday photos. Here are four things for us to consider:
• Turn off your flash unless you have a very good reason to use it.
• Use a fast ISO — we suggest ISO 800, 1600 or above.
• Avoid camera shake.
• Use a tripod…or, at least, brace the camera. Trust your camera’s built-in meter.

And now for two of their photos.

christmaslights5

christmaslights6

If we do a good job taking the photos we’ll upload them and print the best pictures on cards and other products and pass them around to family members and friends. They’ll like that.

Let us know what you think.

Walter Krieg
wkrieg@dotphoto.com
http://www.dotphoto.com

Posted: 12/5/2016 3:22:21 PM

Other blog posts