NEWSLETTER: on shooting night photography

sent by Scott Kranz |

📸 Photography Tip

In recent emails to you, I've shared photography tips on composition and color theory. Today's tip is a bit more technical, but exciting nonetheless: how to photograph the stars! The quick primer below will touch on how to nail your focus and dial in the proper settings for a night shot.

Focus: you'll want to use a camera and lens with manual focus and to set your focus to "infinity." Focusing to "infinity" means that the farthest objects are at their sharpest. It can be helpful to try this during the day by focusing on a distant horizon and taking note of the exact position of your lens' focus ring. (Note: if your lens has an infinity symbol (∞), take it with a grain of salt, since it may be slightly off.)

Settings: you'll want to manually set your shutter speed, aperture, and ISO to let in enough light to properly expose the dark night scene. As a general rule of thumb, slow down your shutter speed to 10-30 seconds, open up your aperture as much as possible (ideally an "f-number" of f/2.8 or lower, if available), and bump up your ISO to 2000-4000. In a night scene with some ambient light (such as the glow from a nearby town, as in the image below), start with the low ends of these ranges. If the resulting image is still too dark, adjust accordingly (further slowing your shutter speed or increasing your ISO).

Night photography offers a unique opportunity to capture what the naked eye cannot see – the vividness of a sky full of stars and galaxies. And the learning process is often an exciting one, full of breakthroughs and discoveries. For a deeper dive on this subject, read my article 10 Essential Tips for Night Photography.

🎤 Podcast Feature

If you know my backstory, you know I used to be a litigation attorney at a big law firm in Minneapolis prior to becoming a full-time outdoor photographer. I recently had the pleasure of sitting down (virtually) with a former colleague, Andrea Yang, a fellow litigator turned career coach who interviews fulfilled attorneys (and former attorneys) about their careers and lives. In this episode, Andrea and I chat about what prompted my career move and how I've made photography a centerpiece of my life's work. Watch and listen to our full conversation here!

🎁 Freebie


It's officially spring, which means our local natural landscapes will be bursting with rebirth and renewal in no time. And if you're like me, nothing gets me more exciting about spring than experiencing the wildflowers across the West. Download a free phone wallpaper of my "Anza Borrego Superbloom" print (which is also available as a photo, canvas, or metal print in my print shop), and enjoy a rare superbloom wherever you may be.


Until next time,

Scott