How do you write with light in the dark with a camera?

Question

My friend & I have a nikon d40x camera and we tried to do a slow shutter speed of 30,10, 2 & 5 seconds with glow sticks (outside at midnight) and it is not working.

help?

Answer 1

Your problem is your camera is too smart. In the days of film, cameras had two setting you probably do not have, BULB represented by a B which when selected on the shutter would hold the shutter open for as long as you held the shutter release down, and TIME represented by a T which when selected opened the shutter when you pressed the release the first time and closed the shutter when you pressed the release a second time. B was used with a manually triggered flash which was not synced to the shutter. T was just that, a long exposure where you did not have to hold the shutter open. T exposures were usually for things like taking pictures at night by the light of the moon or any other low light situation where there was no motion involved. Any exposure slower than about 1/30th of a second needs a tripod or other fixed position mount to prevent blurring because of your motion holding the camera. You could easily do what you want to do with film and a standard camera. The smarts in your digital camera prevent you from making what in the judgment of the camera, is a mistake. If you can somehow override the shutter and manually make it stay "open" for as long as you need, then you might have a shot at making this work, but I seriously doubt a digital device will respond anything like standard film does. You are the victim of technology. Newer and different technology is not always the best answer... There is something to be said for doing things the old-fashioned way... Which is why I still use a Nikon F2 and standard 35mm film and take slides. The only battery in my camera is the one which powers the lightmeter built into the viewfinder, and if that dies, I can always estimate a decent exposure from my experience. The best thing about film is that it is non-volatile. Film, once processed, never forgets, drops a bit, or gets corrupted. You might consider looking around at a flea market and buying an old 35mm camera with B and T shutter settings and reverting back to regular film... Your mileage may vary...

Edit: Wow, after a moment when I look back and reread my answer, some twit has given my answer a thumbs down. WTF? All I was going to add was that using film with a reasonably fast ISO, like 200, would be a reasonable balance between sensitivity and grain size so that when developed the image does not turn out too grainy. The faster the film, the higher the ISO number, the larger the grain size, the fuzzier an enlargement gets.

Answer 2

Try these guides:

http://www.diyphotography.net/painting_w...

http://lifehacker.com/software/digital-p...

http://www.flickr.com/groups/longexposur...

http://www.flickr.com/search/groups/?q=l...

and this youtube...... shows the video of a guy spinning poi, then shows how it looks photod with a slow shutterspeed.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FkxNdvUT...

and here is a FANTASTIC youtube vid of painting with light: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lW_9SYaWA...

enjoy

Answer 3

you have to raise the ISO up high.

Answer 4

What exactly was "not working?"  If you gave us an example photo of your attempt it would help.  My guess is that a glow stick is too big.  I played with a glow stick on camera (15 second exposure) and was able to make a good spiral.  Without a better description of your trouble, I can't give you a better answer.

edit- I used ISO 80 and a small aperature because I wanted plenty of time to draw.  I was about 15 feet from the camera.

Answer 5

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Answer 6

How dark was it, and what aperture were you using? If you're under a streetlight and letting the camera pick the aperture, it's going to stop way down. You need to go to manual mode and experiment with various aperture and ISO settings, in a fairly dark place. you might also try some brighter light sources or slower moves.

Answer 7

Do the same thing but instead of glow sticks try a small LED light, it gives a sharp clearly line to draw with and should work great, the glow sticks are just not bright enough.  Have fun!

Answer 8

You may want to raise the ISO to 400 or 800, and be sure the aperture is set to the lens' widest option (f/2.8, f/4,etc). As glow sticks are not all that bright, try moving them slowly. That should help a great deal.

BTW, the lens cap was off, right? :)

p.s. Your camera is FINE. From the original post it's clear this is not a technology issue as stated below, but one of exposure. Using flashlights or LED's, as someone suggested below, will work as well and solve the exposure issue, but if you're set on glow sticks, you will still be able to make it work. Go give it another shot and good luck