Light 5: Artificial Lights

Ok, the sun has gone down now. It is dark. no twilight or afterglow is left, the sky is pitch black.
So? Is it finally time to call it a day? No, my friend, not yet. You still have lights. Not natural, artificial they may be, but still, LIGHTS!

Street lights: It is very difficult to ascertain the color temperature of street lights, They emit in various narrow spectral bands. And these bands produce very unpredictable results on digital sensors or films. But still, I have seen, Tungsten films sometimes produce good results, so does "Tungsten" white balance in digicams. But sometimes they give an eerie greenish light to the shot, which again, I am personally very fond of.

Indoor Light- Fluorescent: Fluorescent lights emit diffused lights. Quite well-suited for B/W photography. But in case of color photography, use a "fluorescent -> daylight" (FL-D) filter over the lens in an attempt to compensate, in case of a film camera, and Turn the white balance to "Fluorescent", in case of Digitals. The light is quite low too, so use exposures of f/2.8 and 1/15th of shutter speed.

Indoor Light- Incandescent: The light bulbs are much warmer than the daylight, throwing a loud yellow cast over the shot, which, can be compensated by a blue filter over the lens. Again, in case of digitals, tweak the white balance to "Incandescent".

Artificial Lights cool tip: Take lots and lots of photos, until you yourself are not satisfied with the results! ;)

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