Fourth of July pictures from San Diego's Big Bay Boom! (part 1)

Fourth of July pictures from
San Diego's Big Bay Boom!
(part 1)

My girlfriend and I had the rare privilege of going out with the bosses (Russel and Jim) to watch the fireworks at San Diego's Big Bay Boom! yesterday. I understand directly from the bosses' mouths that they rarely go out with people.

If you are ever in San Diego, you should call these two to be your personal tour guides; they know San Diego like no other. Secondly, if you ever get to spend some time with the two of them and talk about real estate, photography, life.... do it! These two are funny and knowledgeable about more stuff than you can imagine.

I also found out that neither of the bosses knew how to take nightime pictures, which, of course includes fireworks. I think they do now. They wanted to increase the ISO to make the camera sensor more sensitive. Logical, maybe, but not a good tactic.

Instead of increasing the ISO, it's the exposure time that you want to increase. Keep the ISO at 100, maybe 200 max, depending on what you set the f/stop to. However, increasing the exposure time means keeping the shutter open, sometimes for as long as 30 seconds.

When it comes to fireworks, I think 30 seconds is too long and makes a picture that is too busy with too many fireworks in it. I prefer 10 seconds.

Keeping the shutter open that long requires keeping the camera steady and preventing camera shake. You could set the camera on the ground, in a tree, on a car top, or even — gasp! — a tripod! The boss doesn't like tripods and monopods although he has both of them. He considers them an inconvenience. Sometimes, though, it's that inconvenience that can provide a great picture. He used his tripod last night to take fireworks videos (you can already see one in his blog, the Grand Finale).

My camera is an older Canon Rebel XS, so it doesn't have a video function. (I've offered to trade with the boss, even steven, but no luck.) That meant that Russel would be doing videos and I would be taking still pictures (I KNEW there was a reason the boss brought me along!).

In part two coming up about an hour after this one, I'll show you the best twelve pictures I took last night. I'll follow that post with a tutorial on removing smoke and smoke glare from your fireworks pictures to make them sparkle. You didn't really think that all those great pictures you see just happened, did you? You can do it, too, very easily!

 

 

Twenty most recent posts

1. Happy Fourth of July!
2. Pets Rule! at SeaWorld San Diego
3. Pay It Forward — I was supposed to go to the beach!
4. Presenting "The Epiphyllum Collection"
5. Bad picture? Make it look badder!
6. My Top 10 tips for taking great pictures — Tip #8
7. QR codes even the boss should like!
8. Using Microsoft Word to take a so-so picture and make it a great picture
9. An easy way to create interesting photos
10. My Top 10 tips for taking great pictures — Tip #7
11. Pay It Forward — Sometimes the gas pump has a life of its own
12. The North Chapel at Liberty Station (the old Naval Training Center)
13. Footprints in the sand
14. If you want a featured post, take your girlfriend to the beach!
15. My Top 10 tips for taking great pictures — Tip #6
16. Can I have real estate opinions if I'm not in real estate?
17. My Top 10 tips for taking great pictures — Tip #5
18. On a clear day you can see forever
19. My Top 10 tips for taking great pictures — Tip #4
20. Pay It Forward — Thank you, Al and Peggy Cunningham

____________________

All pictures are copyright