How To Take Photos On A Night Out
Photos taken in a dingy pub or club can look horrific - unless you make the most of the situation and learn how to take amazing night out shots.
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Step 1:
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Lighting
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Parties, pubs and clubs are generally dark places with erratic lighting, so as to encourage mismatched couples to hook up. You need to learn to use this to your advantage.
A decent flash will be your best friend here – but knowing how to use it is integral. If you're too close to your subject they'll look washed out and utterly terrified, too far away and it won't penetrate the special levels of wispy darkness reserved for pubs and clubs.
Don't be afraid to switch the flash off – it can make for some excellent moody, stylised shots.
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Step 2:
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Play around with your camera's settings
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The trouble with night out photos is that they can often appear bland and mundane compared to your memories of a wild night.
Digital cameras these days come crammed with a whole host of settings you've probably never even noticed, so why not take the time to look into them?
Tricks like slowing down the shutter speed or adjusting the ISO settings, for example, will give you some really funky effects.
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Step 3:
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Use interesting angles
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Nights out aren't flat, boring and horizontal; if anything they're the very epitome of ‘at a slight angle', so why not take your snaps to match?
A little tilt here and there will make the occasional kooky shot stand right out.
One word of warning -- depending on how much you've had to drink you may be naturally tilting. Any additional tilt on your part may result in a ‘full 180', which means your photos are back to horizontal and dull, albeit upside-down.
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Step 4:
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Be Trigger-Happy
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Shots that relate to each other make for better memories of a night out than a stand-alone shot. Three or four photos of an event such as someone opening a present or downing a pint work much better than one shot on its own.
You're telling a story of the night out through your photos, so if your camera has a function to take several snaps with a single click, use it. They make for great sequences of someone dancing, so make sure your remove all the old junk from your memory card before you set off…
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Step 5:
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Editing
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Don't leave the photos as they are— run them through your favourite editing package and remove any imperfections or problems such as red eye. A quick touch up and brighten will work wonders, and will wow your chums when you inevitably upload them to Facebook.
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Night out photos are a pain, and it's mostly due to shoddy lighting conditions. But a little effort goes a long way, here. Try to take funky photos that stand out, and you'll have a bunch of amazing photos to remember.
