My First Night Photos

I went outside at night to take couple of pictures to practice on using Manual mode and low shutter speed to get well exposed night photos. Definitely I needed my tripod in order to keep the Camera still. At night , the best mode to use is Manual as I can control both the Shutter Speed and Aperture at the same time.
The goal is to get best exposure by balancing the Shutter speed with the Aperture, the more the aperture is wide opened the more light get into the sensor and hence better exposure but this may impact the depth of field and can cause spot lights to get out of focus and appear as blurred.

In regards to Shutter Speed, the slower value means the shutter stay open for longer period which allow more light to get in but when you go with slow speed this mean moving things get blurred as the camera will not able to capture the movement specially with low lighting conditions,but at night most likely I will not take photos for moving objects unless to compose some nice light effects (like moving cars on highway)

if the shutter speed is increased this mean better capturing of movement but it will decrease the amount of light which make the picture dimmed and under exposed.

I played with Shutter Speed and Aperture trying to get best exposure and effect and took below pictures. If you noticed the Fountain water is blurred , it comes out nicely also the water color looks solid. The second note is the spot lights when I was trying to figure out the best exposure I was keep looking at the light beams that come out from the spot lights, if the beams are clear then most likely the exposure is good (which means they are in focus and not over or under exposed)

my rule of thumb (as I don't know if it is a known rule of thumb) is set the shutter speed to the slowest value (30 seconds in Nikon D60) and open the lens to its maximum Aperture (lowest F stop,in my case as I'm using 18 - 55 mm lens is) then look at the picture after I take it, if it is over exposed I start increase the speed (20 seconds or 10 seconds) then I start playing with the Aperture to get the light beams clear (by increasing the depth of field, which means high f stop i.e. f4.5 or more)

below are the pictures with the various values for Shutter speed and Aperture.

Device: Nikon D60, Lens: VR 18-55mm F/3.5-5.6G, Focal Length: 18mm, Aperture: F/3.5, Shutter Speed: 30s, Exposure Mode: Manual, Exposure Comp.: +0.7EV, ISO Sensitivity: ISO 100

Device: Nikon D60, Lens: VR 18-55mm F/3.5-5.6G, Focal Length: 18mm, Aperture: F/4, Shutter Speed: 10s, Exposure Mode: Manual, Exposure Comp.: +0.7EV, ISO Sensitivity: ISO 100

Device: Nikon D60, Lens: VR 18-55mm F/3.5-5.6G, Focal Length: 18mm, Aperture: F/3.8, Shutter Speed: 20s, Exposure Mode: Manual, Exposure Comp.: +0.7EV, ISO Sensitivity: ISO 100

 

Device: Nikon D60, Lens: VR 18-55mm F/3.5-5.6G, Focal Length: 48mm, Aperture: F/5.6, Shutter Speed: 15s, Exposure Mode: Manual, Exposure Comp.: +0.7EV, ISO Sensitivity: ISO 100

 Device: Nikon D60, Lens: VR 18-55mm F/3.5-5.6G, Focal Length: 18mm, Aperture: F/6.3, Shutter Speed: 30s, Exposure Mode: Manual, Exposure Comp.: +0.7EV, ISO Sensitivity: ISO 100