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Hey all, went out tonight to give my first night shots a try... Armed with my D70, 18-70 kit lens, and a tripod I decided to try to snap some nice pics of the bridge from the Opera House side....

I ran into a bit of a problem. Luna Park's bright lights create an eyesore in the pictures (in my opinion), and it seems that if I meter for Luna Park the rest of the picture is horribly underexposed. Here's a sample picture shot in RAW... No PP at all yet, you can click the picture to enlarge.

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Exif data:

Exposure:        30 sec
Aperture:        f/11
Focal Length:    27 mm
ISO Speed:       200
Exposure Bias:   0 EV


Any advice on what to do in these situations (besides maybe shoot from a different spot )? Thanks!

Try a higher aperture than f11, maybe try to bracket your shots as well and maybe merge it during PP.

also clean your sensor You have two dust bunnies from what I can see.

Pirostitch, I like the merge idea, I hadn't really thought of that. I suppose it wouldn't be too hard to pull a less-exposed Luna Park into the image. I didn't think a higher aperature would be much help as I would only have to adjust the shutter speed/ISO to account for the change in aperature, wouldn't I? And, if I metered to Luna Park, the main subject (bridge and water) would be way underexposed... which brings us back to the PP merge idea.

Also, inspecting the picture at 100% shows 5 dust bunnies (that I can see)... Ugh! How did these annoying little critters get in there so quick?!? I guess I'm swapping lenses too much, or is this normal for about 2 months regular usage?

I'm pretty sure I've seen a thread around here about cleaning the sensor... is that something a photog. n00b could handle without too many problems, or would you recommend looking into having someone do this for me?

Let me know what you guys think, in the morning I'll have to search out that thread... it's way past my bedtime, and I have work tomorrow!