Night Time Shooting

I think the one of the biggest reason why I wanted a DSLR, was because I could get really neat night time shots.  The biggest problem that I had with point and shoot cameras was that at night I couldn't get a good picture at all and I couldn't control the aperture or the exposure time in order to take a picture of the moon or stars.  I also really wanted to get a picture where a cars rear lights are blurred and streaked out in the picture.  With this Nikon D5100 I was able to accomplish most of these things.  I think I need a bigger tripod and a little more understanding on how to work the controls to get a good picture of the stars.

Switching to Manual mode on my camera, I found that the setting that were changed on dial were  the same on the  full Manual mode.  I also found that when I zoomed in on the moon, the camera had a hard time focusing on it, and produced a blurry shot

If I zoomed away, everything was crisp.  I don't suppose it helped that there were clouds  in front of the Moon

If I zoomed in, blurry

Zoomed out, crisp.  And it was neat because I got a car to pass by leaving a nice light trail.

Another Light trail

Focusing on the house, and with enough time, the stars showed up a little.

I zoomed in just a little, and I got a nice picture

After seeing a cool picture of the Y from http://plukehansen.blogspot.com/ during homecoming week , I wanted to get a shot similar to his.  After removing my shoe to use it as a tripod/base, I got these shots.

Ooops the camera tilted down a little 

Some were better than others.  But with a shutter speed at 8 seconds I feel like I got the right amount of light to get my shot

I have no idea what I was focused on

Isn't this a grate picture....(get it?)?

I thought I'd get Michelle on a few of these.

I think this is the best one from the night.  Google does weird things to the order of my pictures when I upload them.

This one is pretty nice too.

I told Michelle that she is a Trophy Wife, but without all the negative connotation to that idea.

 Now My Attempts at taking pictures of the stars.

I think this is harder, when you are in the city, by a fairly busy street, with house lights on from the neighbors

I just couldn't figure out how to focus on them.

Me playing with a flashlight.  It didn't really work out

This one doesn't have to do with "Night Time Shooting" but it is of me and one of my best friends Cameron Bradley.  This was taken after the baby blessing of his little girl.

Another one that doesn't have to do with "Night Time Shooting".  But since William is looking so cute, I thought that it should be included.