 Yo, what up welcome back to another episode of the notebook photography hour featuring me emo depressed Walmart Ryan Gosling Have you ever created something and then looked back at it with disappointment? Like maybe you could have done better Well, you and my parents aren't alone I recently took this photo as part of an experiment in pushing ill for Delta 3200 looking back on it I kind of feel like It could be a portfolio worthy shot if I just took more time and just got it right so I thought I'd take the opportunity to Discuss some tips just the tips for shooting film at night as I returned to the spot where I took the original photo Which I'm now starting to realize is a popular teenager smoke drugs and make-out spot Fasten the fury is Burbank drift Shooting film at night is a little tricky if you choose to shoot handheld So it helps to bring a tripod a cable shutter release and most importantly your game face I've talked to a few people who don't like carrying around a tripod, but just fucking bring one dog It'll make everything way easier and you won't get any motion blurry shots That look like your vision after you pound seven shots at tequila. Trust me I'm an encyclopedia of knowledge on both topics This time around I'll be shooting with the trusty Mamiya seven I shot with the Pentax 6x7 last time which has a huge mirror in it that Slaps up and slaps down whenever you take a picture and it's pretty loud Which I'm sure the neighbors thought was just some heavy artillery fire The reason I even mentioned something like that is because a huge mirror like that might cause some camera shake if you're not fully locked down Most cameras don't have this issue or at least have mirror lockup So you can probably just ignore everything I just said like usual Be sure to use the cable shutter release so you don't accidentally shake the camera when you press the shutter If your camera isn't compatible with cable shutter releases, then I guess you're f***ed I'm just kidding. Look for a self-timer option on your camera that you can set to take a photo two or three seconds after you press the shutter I would recommend staying away from any film that's below 100 ISO instead going for some film That's in the 800 ISO range Kodak Portra 800 and Cinestill 800T are very popular options for night photography I'll be using Cinestill for my shot Not everyone is a huge fan of Cinestill 800T because the film imprints these orange blobs around the highlights of your image That are called halations. I happen to think that they're pretty cool. So I'm with Cinestill till the tragic end I'm Cinestill's ride or die b***h Yeah, I highly recommend bringing a handheld light meter. They're more accurate than the light meter on your phone And uh, it just kind of makes you look like you know what you're doing You may get called a nerd by on-looking bystanders But you'll show them in the end when you post your perfectly exposed photo to instagram and you get 12 likes instead of the usual 4 If you don't have a handheld light meter, this is the light meter that I use on my phone I'm not sure if it has a name other than the highly creative totally original light meter free What should you meter for at night? This is a hotly debated issue in the community and I'm the only one with the right answer The answer is it's up to you as the photographer night scenes are generally pretty high contrast So I try to meter for any mid-tones I can find If you can't find any mid-tones, uh, usually I'll just meter for the shadows and go two stops darker Not a fan Do one stop overexposed If I'm at half of a second, so now I'll do one second If you're unsure about the exposure, but the composition is cake then take another shot expose one stop brighter or hell Even two stops brighter. Is this two stops overexposed? The same can be done in reverse too. So take another shot one stop darker But uh, be warned if you're shooting medium format and you're bracketing every shot This can actually eat up your roll pretty quick. Okay. I'm gonna do one stop underexposed So that'll be one fourth of a second When all is said and done just pick the best exposure that fits your original vision Or if you're like me and don't have any creative vision left, just pick the least ugliest one Okay, these next two tips are optional, but you better f***ing do them anyway Consider shooting at f8 or f11 I picked this tip up from the god of night photography himself Willem Verbeek because it's actually a really solid suggestion All right, this one's gonna be at f11. So f11 means four seconds Every lens is different for sure But shooting around f8 is typically the sharpest for your lens Plus more of your shot is in focus compared to shooting wide open if that's something you care about Highlights in your shot will also tend to burst up in sort of like a star like pattern Which adds some nice texture to your shot If you want to add some flair to your otherwise boring ass photo Consider using a promise diffusion filter for night shots They essentially glow out the highlights a bit and make everything a bit more atmospheric And then of course the very important lens hood At night, I've been using the tiff and black promissed at one half, but that's a bit strong for my taste So I think I'm going to cut it down in the future to a quarter So we're going to be shooting this one with a uh one quarter diffusion filter A bonus from diffusion filters If you're shooting cinestill is that the diffusion filter will actually glow out any halations that might appear and kind of cancel Amount a little bit these shots were all taken with cinestill 800 t and with the tiff and black promissed at one half And as you can see there isn't really an excessive amount of halation Anyway, this is the take that I went with uh, and I'm pretty happy with it So in the end if you're anything like me and you're up at night already fighting crime on the streets of la dresses shrek You may as well give night photography a go and see if it's your thing. I guess what I'm saying is Don't be surprised if you're getting mugged and you hear a sound at the end of a dark alley that you're in Standing at the end of the alley is a dark silhouetted figure. It's massive and has antennas. Oh my god It's shrek. You smell the faint smell of sh**. It's the mugger He sh** his pants shrek starts charging down the alley yelling his battle cry and the mugger takes off fearing for his life So yeah, hopefully some of these tips helped you because night photography is really fun And worry not if you're getting mugged in a dark alley one night. I got you. I mean Shrek's got you Hey, yo, what's up? Uh, are you sad that the video's over? Me too, but I have some good news for you if you're in the mood for some more film photography content I was recently on the analog talk podcast Uh hosted by chris and tim. It's a podcast where they talk about everything film related So so if you're interested in hearing about my take on film photography and my channel Then uh, I'll leave a link in the description and uh, whatever happens happens I'll see you guys on the next video, which will be in two weeks