First try to take outdoor beamshots

I noticed there are a couple of things I could use.

A tripod and a possibly tad much better camera. I´m not blaming this one, good bang for buck but still ;)

Manual settings, 1 sec, ISO200 and F3.4 (smallest).

Test range. (I live in that house a bit left from point of shooting)

Ultrafire C12, drawing 3+ Amps

Smallsun ZY-T13, modded to draw ~2.2Amps and waiting for correct resistors to arrive.

Last, my trusted EDC. Solarforce L2 with Intl-O. 3A NW Dropin

I think you did a great job for first try. Those probably are a little underscored. Try slowing your shutter speed to 1.2” which is 1.2 sec and take some more and then put them on you computer so your can see them. Try to remember what it looked like to your eyes in person. If still underscored, go to 1.5” which should be 1.4 sec shutter. And repeat the same procedure. On my camera for up close shots, I like 1 sec or maybe 1.2 sec. On shots 100yds or farther, I typically like using 1.4 sec(1.5” setting), but I will admit the last time I took pictures of the TK70 and K40 I was using 1 sec shutter and for shots at 220yds and farther and they really were very close to what my eyes seen. But typically when zooming in with a camera, it will see a lot better than what your eyes will see due to the magnification difference between the camera and your eyes.

But feel free to experiment.

Again excellent job.

Good stuff!

It’s best to keep external to the light, light sources out of the pics - it makes it a bit harder to see the beams.

But a lot better than the many, many attempts I made before showing any.

Keep up the good work!

That’s very true Don.

I have to admit where I live I am blessed. The perfect place to take outdoor beamshots. You can’t get more pitch black than this. Well unless your inside of a cave. Typically my neighbor don’t have that light on when I take pictures.

Where I spend many of my holidays is great for the same reason - the nearest streetlight is 11 miles away on the other side of a mountain (by Scottish standards - it is less than a kilometre high at the highest point). The dogs love it too.

It is where the 40 metre beamshots pictures were taken last year.

These days I need the 400 metre beamshots - which is tricky when the place is in the middle of a forest.

I know a lot of deep space star watchers who regard the moon as light pollution…….

Thanks for good points!
Hard to say if these look like they actually appear to bare eye - that street light is messing up.

I had one set of pic from darker place but I had the manual focus waaaay too close compared to target.
Kind of forgot to adjust it, LOL. Pics were too blurry…

I must say I looked BLF Users pics to find some preset values, since I haven´t got much clue on manual settings of a camera.
I was just going in, I took first (bad) pics elsewhere and the remembered to set focus and took some before getting back in.

Good thing, these streetlights should go out at about 11PM. Bad thing is, I have to wake up at 4:30AM :stuck_out_tongue:

Anyway, I will post more later in the winter.
Dry cold air should allow good throw :slight_smile:

Nice results for your first get go. I tried the other night and all I got was black. DOH

Well the one thing I have learned is what your screen on your camera shows and what that same pictures shows on your computer screen is two different things. That’s why I like taking the pictures on different shutter speed settings from 1 to 1.4 sec and then analyze them to what you personally feel you saw in person. Now your camera may be a little different than mine. But I personally feel on longer shots that 1.2 to 1.4 sec is just about idea.

And if you get mixed up in your settings, you can use this website below by copying and pasting your image url link of the picture you uploaded to a picture hosting site into the top link of this webapage.

http://regex.info/exif.cgi

Here below I’ll copy and paste your 2nd photo you posted above in the space at the top where it says iamge URL:

Now once I did that I have to click to the right where it says view image at URL:

This will tell you all you may want to know about your photo and camera settings.

http://regex.info/exif.cgi?imgurl=http%3A%2F%2Foi46.tinypic.com%2F9pqufl.jpg

A tripod makes a world of difference in taking sharp pictures with no blur. I always take about 3 to 4 of each beamshot and pick which one I feel gives me the best photo. Also what I have learned what helps even more to taking super sharp clear images without the blurry effect is to use the 2 sec timer feature if your camera has one. That way you camera remains perfctly still while the photo is being taken instead of your finger pushing the snapshot button and moving the camera while the photo is taken. Give that one a try.

Nice pics CheapThrills! Maybe you need to use that ZY-T13 to put out the streetlight first!

-Garry

Heheheh, too bad I don’t know, if they have that sensor somewhere or are they timer controlled…

This is actually great advice that everyone who takes beamshots should heed. It took me a while before I found these out myself.