One of the frustrating things about available-light (non-flash) photography is that the good shots sometimes occur in places and at times that put them just out of reach. If you lower shutter speed, camera shake ruins the image, or if you open up the aperture, you lose all depth of field. Pro photograhers have a good way of shooting in low-light that allows them to keep shutter speeds high and apertures small: they use a high-speed film. Before doing this exercise, look through the book Night Work, by Michael Kenna.
Step I
Load a roll of 400 film into your camera. This roll comes with 36 exposures. Change your ASA setting to 1600.
Step II
Take a lot of time thinking about what to shoot, and how to set up your shots. Take some test meter readings, just to make sure there will be enough light to hand-hold the camera, to keep the shutter speed above 125th second. These are low-light shots, not no-light shots.
Where to shoot? In a classroom, in Keku, outside at night under a streetlight.
In general, you want to find shots that don’t “straddle” two lighting situations, with huge extremes between highlights and shadows. For example, you might want to avoid indoor shots that look out through doors and windows to bright outdoor areas.
At the same time, try to locate shots that have some contrasts between highlights and shadows. It’s a fine line.
Step III
Take meter readings so that any light sources (lamps, streetlights, overhead lights, etc) do not appear in the viewfinder. You might have to point the camera down, away from the light sources to do this.
Step IV
STOP! Check your shutter speed. Is it above 125th second? If not, put the camera on something like a chair or table, or wait and borrow a tripod. If you need to shoot at 60th, also stop your breath and try not to jerk the shutter release.
Step V
As always, bracket. Since you have lots of film this time, bracket two stops in each direction, for a total of five negatives for each separate image.
Step VI
Take six different shots, for a total of 30 images. Six shots means six different compositions. This might mean changing from horizontal to vertical, or finding a different angle. In reality, you can take the whole roll of just one subject within ten or fifteen minutes.
Step VII
See me for instructions for processing in T-Max developer.
What should you see?
If you bracketed correctly, your contact sheet should look like a good darkroom test strip: some frames will be too dark and some too light. However, at least one should be correctly exposed in each group of five. If you were to print those five or six images, they should look similar to the images in Night Work. And like Kenna’s images you might notice that they will be extra grainy. You don’t get something for nothing: grain is the price you pay for increased film speed. Learn to like it.