I detailed my mom's Cayenne S today with my Sonus stuff. It looks great. I took some pics after I was finished as I was getting dark. I've attached them. This leads me to my question; can someone give me some suggestions on taking pictures at night? It seems when I take them with the flash on, everything is dark, yet when I turn the flash off, the pictures just get blurry. I am using a Digital Rebel XT.

 

Basics:
1 Tripod
2 Higher ISO
3 Lower f/stop
The tripod is the biggest help with low light.

 

Thanks for the quick reply. I will look into buying a tripod.

 

see this thread on night photography and this one How-to :: Making better MINI photographs

 

U dont need a tripod to get "the shot" altho a tripod is essential.

You can balance the camera on anything sturdy, boxes, table, chair, tree, BUSH!

Anything that will not wobble basically!

Yep and also kill the flash for night pics.

Nice clean car tho

 

If you're gonna use a tripod, go for the lowest ISO.

 

Thanks everyone for the replies. Do you think a cheap SLIK SDV-20 tripod will do me fine, or would you recommend I save the money and just wait until I can purchase a higher end tripod?

 

Depends on how and how much you're going to use it. If it's just for one photo shoot, go cheap. If you're looking for years of service, wait for something better.

My first was a cheapie and I got quite a bit of service out of it. Unfortunately, I kept it in my trunk (pre-MINI days, so don't give me the 'boot' comments ) and it broke just from sliding around the trunk. After that I bought a Manfrotto/Bogen from B&H Photo and I'll never need to buy another again.

P.S. I agree with blacknblue...low ISO if the camera's not moving.

Other tips:
Use either the timer or remote release to minimize camera shake.
Use a small aperture (large number)...most lenses do best over f/8.
Bracket (take lots of shots with different shutter speeds)
Keep that flash turned off

Here's one I took using these techniques:

6s f/11.0 at 20.0mm iso100

 

All the advice here is good. A couple of points, since I detail cars and invariably end up having to take my "After" shots after dark...the BEST advice, esp since this is your Mom's car--

Wait until daylight and shoot the picture.

I know sounds simple, but there's good reasoning---besides the fact it will be a lot easier to shoot pictures of it---you really want the sunlight to be gleaming off the car to show how great it looks. You just can't get that at night.

If you must shoot it in the dark, turn off the on camera flash--it just ruins the feel of the image.

Just RAW instead of JPEG if at all possible.

Here are some sample shots showing different scenarios:

Shot hand held with flash and 28-70mm lens
Pretty sucky and amateurish if you ask me!


Shot immediately afterwards without flash and using natural lighting--but it was hand held and pic was kinda blurry due to long shutter speed


I switched to a 50mm lens which is super fast, and I put it on a nearby ladder--but it was tall and rickety--so I had to place it on one of the steps--I set the timer so I wouldn't shake it, and I set focus to the grill--a mistake cause the whole image is kinda soft and out of focus. (Blurriness may be hard to see at this reduced size.)


The Mid Day sun can be beneficial for certain kinds of shots--I wanted to show how bad the finish was before I began working on this Toyota Tacoma Prerunner


I also wanted to show the progress I was making in restoring the finish


Some beauty shots---shot during the "golden hour". As you can see from the blue painters tape--I wasn't finished yet--but wanted to take advantage of the light before it became completely dark.



This was at the end of this detail, really too dark for a good picture


Fortunately this was a 2 day detail, so this is what I shot the next day


Finally, sometimes a bit of "blatant" Photoshopping can be used to really show the Before and After. I used painters tape on the ground and reference points when I shot these. I left the lens wide to aid in repeatibility.





And a final variation of that last pic