So a few people thought today’s comic was me saying that it’s impossible to take pictures of fireworks. Absolutely not the case, obviously – otherwise, no photos of fireworks would exist. Today’s comic was more of me griping (as usual) about the general public’s misuse of the flash on their camera or cameraphone.
It’s actually fairly easy to photograph fireworks, IF you have the right camera and setup. If you’re using a phone or MOST point-and-shoots, just forget about it. You might catch some blurry colored streaks, but they’d hardly be photos worth remembering. See, even though those fireworks LOOK really bright to the naked eye, there’s actually not a lot of light hitting your camera lens. If your camera has the ability to adjust aperture and exposure time, as well as the ISO speed, you can photograph them just fine. Open up the aperture wide, adjust the exposure length, and find a decently high ISO – you’re good to go. The thing is, most point-and-shoots aren’t really set up to handle this. Night mode might work okay, but you’re going to need a tripod, and you’re going to need to set the shutter off remotely – your hand pressing the button is going to be enough to wobble the camera and cause the photo to be blurry.
I was mostly trying to address a fundamental misunderstanding of how the flash works. It’s really only useful (and I use the term loosely) if the subject to be illuminated is within ~5-6 feet from you, depending on the flash. Past that, you’re subject to the Inverse Square law. Basically, let’s assume the effective distance of the flash is 5 feet, and call the brightness of the flash “1” at that location. If you tried to use it on something that was 10 feet away, the light wouldn’t be HALF as bright, it’d be 1/4 as bright. If you then moved another 5 feet away and tried to use it, you’d be down to 1/9, then 1/16, then 1/25, and so on and so forth. So if, say, you’re in a stadium trying to take a photo of the band on stage, you may as well just turn the flash off, ’cause it ain’t gonna do a DAMN thing, besides annoying everyone around you. Actually, in most cases, you’re better off turning off the flash ANYWAY, ’cause if you have the ability to adjust the camera for shooting in low-light, flash-free photos will USUALLY come out looking better in the long run anyway.
I’m not discounting flash by a long run, don’t get me wrong. You can often use a flash combined with a longer exposure to expose the foreground, then allow the background to fill in a little more slowly, which results in a better photo. Or, if you have the ability to aim the flash away from the subject and maybe bounce it off the roof, you’ll get some fantastic, natural-looking photos. (without a harsh shadow and red-eye) Flash has a use, believe me. It’s just so often MISUSED, ruining so many pictures, that it’s becoming a bit of a pain. And mostly, it’s just annoying to have a bunch of people taking flash photography of fireworks, when none of those photos will EVER, EVER come out. I’d rather they just sat there and enjoyed the show than create a bunch of black images. :P
