Canada Day! Time to Shoot Some Fireworks

Any holiday, whether Canada Day, Victoria Day or the Fourth of July, when there are fireworks, offer a great opportunity to get some spectacular photographs. But how do you shoot fireworks.

Location
First, find the location from which you will be shooting. What do you want to include in the shots? Are you going to include the landscape, people or just the sky?
I used to always try to just capture the fireworks all by themselves. But I found that the shots that I was happiest with, were ones that included the location I was in. Look for interesting features to include in your composition. Are there trees or interesting architecture you could include. Fireworks over water add the possibility of including great reflection in the shot. And of course there is nothing wrong with including people in the shots.
I do suggest that you scout out the location ahead of time as most places with fireworks have crowds of people. You don't want to show up late and then not be able to get a good spot.

Tripod
Using a tripod is of the utmost importance. Handheld shots usually will not turn out very good. The advantage to using a tripod (and a remote trigger if possible) is that you can frame the shot ahead of time then focus on the sky and choose when to release the shutter.

Shoot on Manual
Put every setting that can be put on manual on manual. You want control over your ISO (lower the better), aperture, shutter speed and focus. Auto focus will not work well, if at all, in the dark and you will miss your shots or have a blurred mess. Pre-focus on manual and leave it there.
Also, turn off your flash.

Aperture
Many people believe that, because it's dark, you need to shoot with a wide open aperture. But fireworks are bright. If you let too much light in, you will end up with just bright white, overexposed, fireworks. You are probably going to be better off with a smaller aperture (f/8 - f/16).

Shutter Speed
Think slow. Fireworks are moving through the sky. The patterns they make as they move are what make them spectacular. If you shoot with a fast shutter speed you will only be catching a fraction of that pattern. Here is where you can experiment. Try various shutter speeds. Try from maybe 1/8 of a second to a few seconds or more. See what gives you the best results.

So give it a try.

I will be shooting some fireworks tonight and will post the results.