Re: (no subject)

["Mitchell P. Warner" <indepth@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Lists,

The following is in response to a question from Simon-Wide, regarding New
Year's FireWorks photography on Guam.  I thought the lists might be
interested. 

Fire-Works Photography: It's like war. Hurry up and wait. Mostly boredom
followed by a few moments of insanity. 

I shot digital 35mm, 6x17 (V-Pan) , 4x5 (Zone-6 folding wood-field), 6x7
(Bronica GS-1) and 35mm (Canon EOS).

The 6x17  film advance requires a lot of time. So as to not miss exposures
with the other cameras I began time exposures on the other cameras and then
advanced the 617, started it's next time exposure in time to reshoot the
other cameras. I felt like an octopus.  


Exposures on all the FILM cameras is simple, and getting some good  images
presents no concern. It was the digital camera that caused the most
heart-burn:


Camera: Kodak/Nikon DCS 420 (one of the Kodak/Nikon first adventures in
Professional digital cameras. It's BIG, Heavy and would make a good defense
tool in a riot. Similar to Old Nikon F1 or Canon F1 with the BIG old motor
drive. 

Lens: 28-80 zoom:  Note that the digital chip only sees about 50% of the
35mm frame, effectively changing the 28-80 to ~ 60-160mm zoom.

I'd down-loaded a special page from the Nikon/Kodak pages, about shooting
fireworks, specifically with the older model camera and found that when I
followed their directions that the digital chip 'placed' a lot of noise
artifacts in the black areas.  The chip is 'looking' for anything and is
sensitive to IR , so it places random bits of color artifacts in the dark
areas.  Web page indicated the following:  

ASA 200 setting (was very adamant about ONLY ASA 200)

f-8 or f 11,

Bracket time from 4 seconds up to 10 secs.

Practice proved that, with this particular camera, Kodak DCS420, that any
exposure over 5-6 secs began to put lots of artifacts in the black areas.
Best ASA 200 image was at 2-3 secs, and 3 secs started to have a few too
many artifacts. 
City lights did best at 3-4 secs at about f8.5, but when the framing
included lots of dark sky the artifacts began to appear in great density.

Second test with ASA at 100 was done in an attempt to provide longer
exposures to capture more fireworks bursts per frame. 

ASA 100,  f 5.6, 4 seconds.  Sky just barely began to show a few artifacts
whereas the same exposure at ASA 200 gave way too many artifacts. 

Followed this test with equivalent exposures for ASA up to 6000. 
Just as with film, the 'grain' shown as artifacts in the dark areas, became
greater and more apparent with increased ASA. 

If anyone wants to see comparative images let me know and I'll send
privately. 

Second digital camera,  Nikon 950, with bigger file size, higher
resolution, newer technology, had a fuzzy picture. Actual images at same
ASA and time exposure showed that particular 950 camera to have a MUCH
fuzzier image.  Edges were not sharp, colors not in registration. 
 Cheap lens,  maybe. 

While this, 950,  camera 'looks' like a Point and Shoot, digital technology
has advanced to the point where tiny digital video cams now have quality of
best Beta SP. So I don't want to judge by appearance of the camera, but I
have no idea why the Nikon 950 had the image problems I observed. Side by
side comparison clearly showed that the older camera, with 'real' lenses,
made a better pic.


Mitch Warner