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How to take creative light painting photos for less than $15

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Written by Jemma Pollari

24 Jun 2020

Prompt number:

If you’ve ever shot a wedding, you know that things can, and do, run over. Often it’s the romantic portraits that suffer, because the sun’s set, the reception has to start, and your bride and groom are hankering to be celebrating with their friends and family.

This is one option to cope: keep shooting after dark.

This is not just for weddings, of course. Add it to a family shoot or to an event or party. Even in daylight an ND filter can turn the world dark! Light painting is incredibly fun. It’s a whole new way of looking through the lens, bringing in movement and color in a way that’s impossible to imagine until you review what you captured on the back of your camera.

Light painting: basic night photography skills

This prompt gives you some cheap ways to keep shooting even when the light is gone. There’s a heap of great light painting gear you can get if this kind of imagery appeals to you (both cheap and expensive), but in this prompt I’m going to give you a few ideas that you can try out for less than $15. All you’ll need are some sparklers, glowsticks, and birthday candles.

How to use this photo pose prompt

I’ll go into more detail on flash photography basics for evening events next week with Get Flashy. For now, it’s enough to know that you need to set your camera to expose for the light being painted into the scene. The flash, if used, exposes foreground elements by “stamping” them into the frame before the shutter closes.

Unless otherwise specified, the basic settings you need on your camera and flash for these ideas are:

  • Long shutter speed, e.g. 5, 10 or 15 seconds depending on ambient light and what you’re painting with.
  • ISO 1000 or higher (give the camera a hand detecting the light!).
  • Aperture in the middle of the range, e.g. f/6.3 (helps with focus because it’s hard for camera to lock onto something in the dark accurately).
  • Lens on manual focus. You will need a torch to shine onto your subject so your camera’s autofocus can lock on, then switch the lens to manual focus so it holds the focus. Most flashes have an autofocus grid beam to help with this, but a torch is necessary if you’re not using a flash.
  • Flash (if being used) always set on rear curtain sync (this means the flash fires at the end of the exposure, right before the shutter closes, rather than at the beginning as soon as it opens).
  • ETTL flash mode will work fine for these ideas. ETTL flash sends a tiny burst of flash out before the shutter opens, to test what the right power for the flash is, and then fires the flash on that power when the shutter is open. When on rear curtain sync with a long shutter speed, you’ll see both these flashes (you won’t notice it for a short shutter speed or for front curtain sync).

This is the gear I use for my flash photography:

Inexpensive light painting “brushes:”

When your initials spell H O M E it’s a perfect light painting to celebrate moving into your new house! The Bubble & Lace Photographic Company.

Idea 1: Use sparklers

  • Line everyone up, give them a sparkler each, and have each person write a letter in the air in front of them. Letters will need to be written “mirrored” to appear right way around in camera (e.g. letters like E, F, R, etc). Spell out initials, THANK YOU, LOVE (use a heart for the O), wedding date.
  • Hold sparklers close to a long lens with a wide aperture to have the sparks “rain down” around the couple as they kiss in the background. Use an off-camera flash to light the couple by setting it to rear curtain and having it fire at the end of the exposure.
  • For weddings: give the couple a send off by lining up guests on either side of the exit. Give all a sparkler and then photograph the bride and groom exiting the reception surrounded by sparks. Light bride and groom with a diffused direct on-camera flash.
Thank you to Eevee Photography for letting me feature this stellar example of the sparkler exit. Check out Eevee Photography Sunshine Coast wedding photography here, on Instagram, on Facebook, and on Pinterest.

Idea 2: Use glowsticks

  • Hold glowsticks in hands, and paint loops, arches, hearts, letters, words, swirls. The darker the better for these long exposures. Have your subject move through the frame from one side to the other: enter, paint a heart (etc), and exit to the other side. Tie glowsticks to strings and spin them. Group different colours together or have it all in one colour.
  • If you want a subject visible in your glow stick painting, have the subject pose, and an assistant paint around them (e.g. a heart) and leave before the shutter closes. Have the flash set to rear curtain so that the subject is “stamped” onto the image at the final moment, after the glow stick has been painted in. If you only have one subject (no assistant) then do this: open shutter, subject enters the frame, subject paints, subject leaves frame and drops glowstick, subject gets back in position, flash fires on rear curtain, shutter closes. Count the shutter seconds aloud!
  • Have you seen the glow stick dance videos? Just picture that, add a few hyperactive kids and a dark backyard. Have fun.

Idea 3: Use candles (or fake candles)

  • Capture a romantic portrait at night using the light of candles. Have the candles close between the couple, have them lean in close together, and capture the glow on their faces and nothing more.
  • For a birthday cake, capture the glow on the birthday person’s face.
  • Have subject/s (e.g. bride and groom) lie on the ground. Give everyone in the bridal party an LED candle. Have them walk around the bride and groom in a heart shape. Get up high and shoot down from above.

Creative extension

  • Use an ND filter during the daytime to achieve a light painting effect. Play with your camera settings to see how much of the ambient light you can remove before adding back in your effect.
  • Use an umbrella to catch flash and bounce it down onto your subject for a whimsical portrait. Have one flash in the top of the umbrella (use a tiny magnetic Gorillapod to hide the flash up there out of sight) and another off-camera as a front fill light (diffused with a Lightsphere or Flash Bender). This setup was taught to me by the absolute master of weddings and flash photography, Ben Connolly.
  • Have your subject hold the flash and capture them in a long exposure (e.g. against the night sky), with the flash stamping them in at the end.
A full walk-through of how I took this photo is on Photofocus.

Have you tried light painting in your photography? Tag me @promptographerguide and use the hashtag #promptographerguide to share with us.


Want this prompt in your Field Cards set?

All the info in this prompt post is summarized onto a single card in the Promptographer Guide Field Cards, with the details given in the accompanying Guidebook. All the ideas are given on the one card so you have a rich, comprehensive tool for sparking ideas. I’ve designed it this way so you only need five to ten cards to build a whole photoshoot.

If you want this prompt in your set, make sure you include Set 2: Creative Essentials in your Field Cards.


Field Card Reference

Prompt #016 from Set 2: Creative Essentials.

Tag @promptographerguide and use the hashtag #promptographerguide to share your favorite photos captured with this prompt.

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