Light Trails

[Ronald Barker]

I have never taken images with light trails so my first attempt.

Light trail 1.jpg (179.1 KiB) Viewed 5792 times

Light trail 2.jpg (195.62 KiB) Viewed 5792 times

Light trail 3.jpg (168.42 KiB) Viewed 5792 times

Thank you Tom for your help.

[Rose]

Really nice !! Well done Ron Am just looking at mine and will post some later

[Rose]

Here are some of mine...

Light trails 1_edited-1.jpg (404.5 KiB) Viewed 5790 times

Light trails 2_edited-1.jpg (423.26 KiB) Viewed 5790 times

[Rose]

And two more...

Light trails 3_edited-1.jpg (316.46 KiB) Viewed 5789 times

Light-trails-4_edited-1.jpg (383.94 KiB) Viewed 5789 times

[Paul Heester]

Love these shots and didnt realise this is what you captured last week.

A good tip Ive used previously is to stack multiple images together of trails (in my previous case it was star trails). This keeps the ambient light low by using shorter exposures but still retains the trails. As an example Ive used Ron's 3 images which I had on 3 separate layers in Photoshop and I then set the blending mode of each layer to Lighten.

Light trail stack.jpg (149.68 KiB) Viewed 5766 times

[Rose]

I have three images that I want to do this with but I'm not sure how to do it ! Can you post an idiot's guide please Paul ??

[Rose]

I think I managed to work it out...
This one has been merged from 3 images

Merged trails (web).jpg (149.07 KiB) Viewed 5759 times

[Paul Heester]

I have three images that I want to do this with but I'm not sure how to do it ! Can you post an idiot's guide please Paul ??

Of course! As usual there are numerous ways to do the same thing*, the below covers the easiest I think Im using the naming of Ron's images as a guide.

Load all images into Photoshop so they are tabbed at the top.
Right-click on the layer of "Light trail 3" and select duplicate layer. As the destination select "Light trail 1"
Close Light trail 3
Right-click on the layer of "Light trail 2" and select duplicate layer. As the destination select "Light trail 1"
Close Light trail 2
On your remaining Light trail 1 image the layers should look like below:




stack1.JPG (17.74 KiB) Viewed 5759 times


Now select both top layers (left-click and SHIFT) and change blend mode to Lighten:




stack2.JPG (18.06 KiB) Viewed 5759 times


Et voila!

Its possible that your camera may have moved during exposure so you may need to move the layers to align them properly.

*You can also use File > Scripts > Load Files into Stack if you have alot of images.

[Rose]

Thanks Paul ! This is pretty much what I did I think

[davidb]

Wouldn't this topic be better off in "Techniques and Tutorials" ?