Remember ,remember the fifth of November..

That time of year is upon us again.The night sky full of explosions and flashes from the fire work displays we all make our pilgrimage's to every year.In celebration of the burning of the dude who tried to blow up the houses of parliament about a million years ago.If someone tried to do that now i'd shake their bloody hand,
Fire work night makes for some beautiful night photography.With beautiful colours and light trails .And they keep the kids entertained for a while too. Everyone's a winner :0).
I bought the kids some sparklers the other day to keep them entertained and couldn't resist getting a few snaps in of them to get me honed into the camera settings ill be needing on the night.
My only worry is if the weather is bad on saturday night.Even tho my 5D mkII is weather sealed.I still don't have the stones to take it out in the rain.The second any unwanted liquid falls from the sky my camera gets put away.Rather daft really as i have seen you tube videos of Kai Wong from Digital Rev using a 5D mkII in a monsoon.And while doing a review of the EF 100 mm f2.8 L macro lens he poured an entire 2 liter bottle of water over the body and lens .Never the less he didn't pour the water over MY 5D mkII.
Well if of course the weather holds out and all goes to plan i will be posting some beautiful shots of my chosen firework display on saturday evening.If you are thinking ,What a good idea, I'm going to shoot some fire works too.Dial in a slow shutter speed,Maybe a couple of seconds to capture the light movement.And make sure you use a tripod otherwise even the slightest movement from you holding the camera will spoil any decent shot you might have got .And if possible use a remote shutter switch to avoid any camera shake while pressing the shutter button.If you don't have a remote shutter switch you could always use the cameras timer release but this can be inaccurate causing you to miss some of the action.I use manual mode.And switch the lens out of auto focus and into manual focus and focus into where the action is going to be ,ensuring the shot will be sharp.make sure you frame the shot right getting the composition how you want the shot to look. At the right focal length.If you have a remote switch you could also use Bulb setting giving you more freedom to end the shot exactly when you got the shot you want.I would be using an aperture of between f8 to f16 and for a nice low noise shot stick to iso 100.
A good tip to keep in mind is to shoot up wind so you don't get the smoke getting in between camera and the fireworks making the shot really hazy. preparation before hand is key.
If you have a remote shutter cable ,And do choose to use bulb mode .Why not try having a piece of black card at hand .And while the action is happening expose the sensor .And when it stops,cover the end of the lens with the black card until the next firework goes off.Giving you more than one explosion in one frame .
Well good luck and happy snapping .Comments below please :0)