Ahoj! This is Zdenka. I think I've just had enough with this chair. I've been
so patient with this chair. Do you know how many times I have to edit the video
because of this beautiful sound? I think it's time to go, it's time to replace it.
So.... yeah..... but I can't get up because then you would see that I'm wearing jogging
pants so I'm just gonna try to sneak up but that's gonna take forever... it is so much
better and quiet and so much softer. I'll show you what I'm sitting on at the end.
Ahoj! This is Zdenka. I've got some goodies here. Lenses, camera, LED lights,
optical prism, glow sticks, another little tiny LED light which actually is
underwater as well. Super cheap. Just discovered it the other day.
Where have you been my whole life? Highly requested topic low light
photography is here. I've got 7 tips how you can improve this area of photography
and obviously this is this month's camera challenge for you and for me as
well. Video challenge is coming up next week.
And if you are new here, welcome. My name is Zdenka Darula. If you want to learn how
to take better photos and videos with the latest gear and possibly participate
in creative camera challenges like this one, consider subscribing. First and
foremost when you are taking photos in low light, you will grab whichever camera
you have at home but you might be a little bit picky when it comes to the
lens because you want to use faster lenses. And how do we know which one is
faster? F/1.4, 1.8 or 2.8 are great in low light because the aperture is wide open
and can take in more light and because the aperture is wide you are able to
shoot with faster shutter speed which means very little camera shake and
sharper photos. So I have here Canon M50 camera and I have here also the
kit lens 15-45mm which is not good because it is f/3.5 - 6.3. It's
gonna perform very poorly in low light and it's gonna be very slow. But I also
have here nifty 50, 50mm lens which is f/1.8 and I have here
Viltrox speed booster which is going to make it even better. So that combo is a
perfect combo to shoot in low light. Also, I could be using if I wanted to Canon M50
with Viltrox speed booster and perhaps this telephoto which I still
have. I was using it with the DSLR because it is F/2.8. It's gonna be very
fast in low light. Whenever you're shopping for a lens and you see the low
number, the f-stop number, that means it's gonna be very good because it's gonna be
wide open. The aperture will be wide open, that's what you want for low-light.
Besides a great lens you might want to have also one of these in your backpack
because low-light photography doesn't mean no light photography. If you are
taking photos outdoors, somewhere in a city, you might take
advantage of street lamps or maybe neon signs or little light coming from the
stores window. If you are taking photos indoors, then just use a little lamp on a
table or take advantage of that little light peeking through the window or like
I said have some of these in your camera bag. And these are LED lights.
I love them all and I listed them below the video in case you want to check them
out. Falcon Eyes F7, Weeylite, this little
cheap cube light which is my newest best friend.
Sometimes when I'm taking photos of an object
I need tiny light. This one is still fairly big even though it's small and I
need to hide it sometimes behind the object. But this one does the trick
because it's tiny, it's cube light. The best part of it is that it comes with
these color gels so you can change the color of the light if you need to and
you can stick it right underwater. Having few of those LED lights can get
you highly creative. You can change the lights, you can change the colors, you can
change the strength, you can move them around the objects to see what they do. You
can even put it right behind the object to create silhouette. The possibilities are
endless. Those little things are extremely helpful. I think it's time to
talk about settings and how about we start with ISO. So when you are taking
photos outdoors and it's very bright and sunny, you want to go with the lowest ISO
possible which is ISO100. But the less light, the higher ISO needs to go, so you
might increase the ISO to 200, 400, 800 and so on. Now, the higher you go with the ISO
the more noise, just little dots you will introduce in the images. If you shoot
stock for example, you don't want to go much higher with ISO because the photos
will get rejected for sure. They don't like that noise at all, but if you don't
shoot for stock and you're shooting it for yourself or maybe social media or
just for print, a little bit of a noise can be actually a good thing. Not too
much though, but a little bit. It can create a certain feel about the image,
especially if you are printing it on a canvas. It can be a good thing.
There are many recommendations online which is ISO is good to go with. I would
personally say that every camera and every lens is different, so what I would
do, I would take images with the camera you have and also
with the lens you have. Blow it up on a computer, look at it across the whole
screen and think what is your comfortable level when it comes to noise.
For example for me, this setting I would go up to 1500 ISO. 1500, but I would not
go any higher. I simply don't like that noise that much. If you are taking a
photo of a movement of an object which is in motion, then you will have to
introduce more light because you will need to use faster shutter speed if you
don't want any blur in the images. But if you are taking photos of static object,
non moving object, then consider using slow shutter speed, but for that you will
need to place your camera on a tripod otherwise you will end up with blurry
images which you might not want. That's why these lenses are so expensive,
because they do half of the job. You might also not want to touch the camera's
shutter physically because you might introduce camera shake right there. If
you are taking very long exposure images, it is recommended to use the shutter
release or timer or you can pair your camera with your smartphone and just
simply take the photos from your smartphone. ISO will decide how fast
the light will enter camera sensor and aperture will decide how much light will
enter, so try to go with low f-stop F/2.8, F/1.8 but always check if that's the
result you actually want because the lower the f-stop only tiny little
portion of the image will be sharp everything else will be blurry, the
foreground and background. So if you look at the object make sure that you see
enough sharpness. If it's just too shallow, if it's too little of a
sharpness, then you might increase the f-stop a little bit higher. Whenever you
take photos in low light, you might not always like the colors in the photos
afterwards because you might have selected the wrong white balance. Simply
put, you need to tell the camera how the white should really look like. You
can go through all white balance settings such as lightbulb, tungsten,
shade or you can make your own custom white balance. Once you set that
correctly, you will avoid having the yellow, orange or blue shade in your
photos. It really depends on what type of light you're working with. Your turn now.
Low-light photography theme it is. Take photos outdoors, indoors, not on a bright
sunny day but in a low light settings. Any objects, anything goes and upload
them to ZD camera challenge Facebook group or on your Instagram and use
hashtag #zdchallenge15 for a chance to have your images featured and reviewed
early next month which is July 2020. Don't forget to mention camera lens and
settings you were using, and again if you need instructions how to submit the
images, everything is written below the video in the video description. And again
all the equipment and all the props I was using in today's video except the
flour, you can get that in a grocery store, I listed below the video in the
video description in case you want to check that out. Hit the thumbs up if you
liked today's video and subscribe to all future videos like these. If you have any
questions, comments or simply want to say hi, you can do so in a comment section
below. I'm looking forward to seeing your work, I can't wait.
I'll see you next time. Cau... Ahoj...
I really had it with this chair. I mean... like I did put on a little bit of weight.... but
just because it's all that thing we are at home and I can't go skating and I
can't go really exercising and all that... but ....not my fault. I didn't really, I
didn't make it like that. I don't even know how much I weigh. The scale broke.
I didn't break it. The battery died and it's just better
not to buy new batteries. So any guesses, do you know what I'm sitting on? By the
sound? Anybody knows? Now.... it's the outdoor cooler. The camping cooler and I have a
cushion on it so it's very soft. Look... one.... two...
See you next time.