It’s that time of year again.

The 4th of July.
This is my FAVORITE time of year. Seriously. More so than Christmas. I love the festivities, the patriotic feeling, the fireworks, parades, the red white and blue, the BBQ’s, the friends, the family.
LOVE IT.

I have tried a couple of times to take firework photos, and I know that at about this time, I am usually surfing Google trying to find the best way to take them. But I thought that I would offer some of my tips, and tricks, and what I plan on doing this year.
Note: All images are SOOC, and not edited at all. Basic EXIF data is at the bottom of the post.

So here we go:

Tip #1: DO NOT position yourself in front of a street lamp (or other obstacle), that is going to show up in ALL OF YOUR PICTURES! I apologize in advance that every image that I am using in this post has that blasted street lamp in it. I could clone it out, but. Eh..  More work, and I would do that if I were making large prints of them. But these are basically just for me. And I didn’t really have a choice in where we were sitting. But if you can arrange it, get rid of the distractions.

Tip #2: Bring a Tripod, and a remote (if you have it). Seriously, you will be using long exposures, and don’t want that shake that you will inevitably have if you are trying to hand hold your camera. You can use the timer, but then it might be off, and you can just press the button with your finger, but be prepared for a little bit of shake.

Tip #3: Use long exposures. Depending on what you want to capture, if you use a fast shutter speed, you aren’t going to get that trail of light. I always click the shutter as soon as I hear them explode at the base. Once I know they are shooting up, I start so I can get that trail up, and then the firework. Sometimes that takes half a second, sometimes that takes 1 second. But then I like the trails out from the center of the firework as well.

Tip #4: Use a Wide Angle Lens. You will want to capture most of the firework, and you won’t be able to do that if you are using a 200mm lens. It also depends on where you are sitting, if you are sitting really far away, go ahead and use a zoom lens, but if you are sitting fairly close, you are going to want to capture as much of it as you can, from the ground up. And there is no guarantee how high they will go.

Tip #5: Keep your ISO down, and your Aperture up. I like to keep my ISO down about 200 -400, and my Aperture at about 5.6 or higher. This will allow more to be in focus, since you don’t have a guarantee where it’s going to go off! And the ISO down that low, will prevent grain from coming in your picture. Yes, this means you will have to have your shutter open longer, but that’s ok as long as you have a tripod.

Tip #6: Set your focus on Manual, and set it to Infinity. This way, you aren’t messing with your camera trying to get it to focus on something with every shot. And you can just focus on shooting.

Tip #7: Play around with different shutter speeds. Start with something like 1/20th of a second and see how it turns out. If it is barely showing up, go longer. If it’s too bright, go shorter. It really is just playing around.

Tip #8: Be Patient. You aren’t going to get the PERFECT shot first time. Especially if you haven’t tried shooting fireworks before! Play around with it, and don’t get frustrated. Everything takes practice and work!

Tip #9: HAVE FUN. Make sure to WATCH the fireworks as well! Have fun, and play around! That’s the main part.

*All images on this post were shot on a Nikon D200, 18-55mm lens at about 35mm, ISO400, f5.6, and between 3 and 6 second exposures. *

If this was AT ALL helpful to you. Please let me know. And I would LOVE to see what you come up with this weekend!
Feel free to share this post, but please make sure you credit or link to my blog.