Johan du Toit Photography: BULB SHOOTING AT NIGHT.

What is Bulb shooting?

You adjust your camera shutter open time whereby you open and close the shutter as you wish.

Lets begin simple. You select Bulb by turning the dial next to the diopter to the very left until the numbers rolling down end with "Bulb" on the display and when looking through the view finder. See photo.

From a tutorial I followed most photographers select and lock the ISO on 200 to reduce noise.
It is essential to set off the camera by remote! You press the remote to open the shutter and you choose how long it stay open and press the remote again to close the shutter.

Remember! You cannot manually focus at night and in darkness. To lock the focus to be perfect to infinity, you have to focus during day time or at last light ... but once you locked the focus, your'e set to shoot basically anywhere.

Let's look at a few examples.

In the first example, my exposure time was 16,4 seconds. ISO 200 and Aperture F 5.66.

In the second photo... just pointing the camera to the stars.. Exposure 152,5 seconds, ISO 200, F 5.66.

Stanley's light on the mountain in Ladismith.

Exposure time 90,4 seconds. ISO 200 and F5.66.

Otto Hager church Ladismith on a full moon night.
Exposure time 133.9 seconds, ISO 200 F5.66.

Helping with the tricky part... focus the camera at night.

Well, the easiest going lens for bulb shooting would be a Af-p lens. That isn't motorized and almost is always in perfect focus. So what if you don't have a Af-p lens and only a Ff-s lens?

You need to lock the lens. Turn the lens to M during the daytime. Focus the lens and I choose a bit of prestic to prevent the lens turning after the focus is set.

On the 18-55 lens I locked the lens precisely on 30.00 mm focal length. Photos taken like this, every subject, close or far would be in focus.

Here is a video showing locking the lens. REMEMBER DO NOT USE THE LENS WITH THE PRESTIC ON A as the prestic will prevent the motor operation and might damage it!