Taking photos through windows

Sometimes you don't really have a choice -- either take the suboptimal shot through a window (whether it be from a car, plane, or tall office building) or don't get a shot at all. Most people will at least try to get the shot through a window and maybe with some luck it'll turn out well. You typically want to have nothing between the lens and your subject -- extra glass means more possible reflections. That said, there are some things you can do to increase your chances of getting a decent shot.

Quoting from "Through a glass lightly":

1: Some of the best city views are from the windows of tall buildings or tourist attractions. Trouble is most people end up with photos of the window and not the view, so the first trick is to position your camera right against the window itself; the outer lens barrel should protect the actual optics from any scratches.

2: Reflections from interior lighting can ruin photos taken through windows, so even when holding your camera close to the glass, try and shield any gaps between the lens barrel and the window itself with your hands or a piece of clothing. By moving the camera you should be able to see any reflections.

3: Your built-in flash is no good to you in this situation, and if it goes off, it’ll just cause more reflections to worry about. So when taking photos through windows, always turn the flash off.

4: Photographing through a sheet of glass or plastic can fool many cameras’ focusing systems. So if your camera is struggling to autofocus simply manually set the focus to infinity – this is indicated on most compact cameras by a figure 8 on its side.

5: Ultimately the best quality photos are when there’s nothing between you and the view. So before following the tips above, see if there’s an outdoor viewing area or some way to open a window and poke your lens out. Obviously this won’t be possible in some places, such as the London Eye, but it’s worth checking for others.

Using tip #1 in the list above (keeping the lens held flat against the window), here's a shot I took through a window of our hotel room in San Diego:

18mm, F/16, ISO 100

It's nothing groundbreaking, but I think it looks pretty good for being taken through a reasonably thick window.

How to get a D200 into 'Bulb' mode

I imagine this wasn't hard to do for most D200 owners. Apparently, I'm not like most D200 owners. It took me a while to figure out how to get the damn thing into Bulb mode.

Here's what to do:

Hold down your Mode button and turn the rear thumb dial (on the right side-top of the back of the camera) until you see the letter M appear in the top lcd display. Let both buttons go. Now you're in Manual mode. Next, and this is the part that took me a while to figure out, you'll need to turn the same rear thumb dial to the left until you see BULB appear in the lcd. This may take a while, depending on how your camera was set before trying this. Don't lose hope... it's in there, you just may need to turn it like 20-30 clicks. The thing is, you probably noticed that if you just start turning the dial, nothing happens. Before your turns actually start doing anything, you have to first activate the auto-focus by either tapping the shutter button halfway or by hitting the "AF-ON" button right to the left of the rear thumb dial. Once you've done one of these, you can start turning the thumb dial and make your way to BULB.

If you're wondering why you would even want to use BULB mode, I use this mode to do long exposure shots at night. It allows me to hold the shutter open for as long as I want, and get cool light-trail effects, which can be seen in the shot below.

Moon Patrol

I've found that it's kind of tricky to get good shots of the moon. Here are a collection of opinions on the best ways to tackle it:

http://www.flickr.com/groups/d200/discuss/72157594363011032/?search=moon

Here's one flickr member's advice:

"Remember that even though you're shooting while in the dark, the moon is directly illuminated by the sun. Therefore, the sunny-16 rule is not a bad place to start (e.g., ISO 100, f/16 @ 1/100). The metering tips above are good if you have the focal length to spotmeter it." -- flickr member MJM

Also, here is PopPhoto's advice:

"Moony 11, 8, and 5.6 rules
There are many different rules that work well when shooting the moon. One favorite for a proper exposure of a full moon is f/11 at one over the ISO setting. For pictures of a half moon, use the same shutter speed at f/8, and for a quarter moon, use the same shutter speed at f/5.6."

Quoted from http://www.popphoto.com/article.asp?section_id=4&article_id=1175&page_number=1