Night shots

I just bought a Canon S3 IS about a month ago and starting to learn about all the features. The shot below is at night with the following setting:

Shutter Speed = 1 second
Aperture = F/3.5
Exposure time = 1 second
Exposure Comp = -1 step
Iso = 80

I really dont understand these numbers yet but after a lot of pics the shot below was the best one. My question is in the second picture (croped from the original) why is the company name blured, what would I change to make it clear?

Thanks

Original

There are a lot of things you can do to clear up the image. The first would be to use a tripod, and it should give you a crystal clear shot almost regardless of the settings. Another option is to bump your ISO-- 80 is really low for night shots, unless you are using a tripod. Go with something higher, like 400 (you can go higher than that, but higher ISO=more grain). Stopping down the lens -i.e. higher f/stop - (i dont know what options the S3 gives for manual control) will give you more focus in the tree to the right and left, though will further slow your shutter speed down. The -1 Exposure compensation will just give you a darker image, with an additional 1 stop in shutter speed (so if there was 0 compensation, the exposure would be longer). I think the biggest concern is either a tripod and/ or higher ISO speed. Hope that helps (sorry if it is rambling..)

Thanks. I was trying to get a really clear image to print out so I kept the iso low, like I said im just beggining so I dont know that much.

sjafari wrote in post #2424743
Another option is to bump your ISO-- 80 is really low for night shots, unless you are using a tripod. Go with something higher, like 400 (you can go higher than that, but higher ISO=more grain).

Whilst this is correct, it's also.. well.. incorrect.
For night photography I recommend ISO 100 or 200. The reason being that depending on what you're shooting, bright lights against a dark background can throw your meter, especially lower end models. God knows how many times it's happened to mine. Also, the last thing you want to see in the black areas is noise IMO. Increasing the ISO will give you noise which is more evident in areas with no light (like the sky for instance).

You also really really really need something stable for night photography. I know tripods aren't always available, and IS can only do so much. Make sure the camera is planted FIRMLY before each shot. If you've got a timer, use it, as your finger pressing the shutter can actually vibrate the camera which isn't what you want.
I would also choose a smaller aperture than f/3.5
Larger apertures tend to give narrow depths of field so certain areas of your scene might not be in focus. Try stopping it down to around f/8 or even f/11 to make sure it's all in focus.... treat the night time scene as a daylight scene and you should be okay.

AdamJL wrote in post #2425045
Whilst this is correct, it's also.. well.. incorrect.
For night photography I recommend ISO 100 or 200. The reason being that depending on what you're shooting, bright lights against a dark background can throw your meter, especially lower end models.

i completely agree about the noise factor in night time shots, but was giving the recommendation assuming that a tripod wasnt handy. ISO 100-200 would definately keep grain low, but the same issue of slow shutter speed would come up again.

Thanks for the replys, I will have to use a tripod and play with the settings
Thanks.

I agree with comments. You can't really get away with night time shots unless you have a tripod or an image stabiliser on the lens or camera. There are ways round this, like using high ISO but you would need a noise removal software to clean it up as best you can.

Also, when shooting at night you will want to ensure the cameras light meter is used to meter off the brightest parts of the image, such as the lights or the sign. Again, you may have to post process for dark some parts if there is not enough ambient light and may need to take two or three shots of the same scene and blend them.

One other reason the company name is like that is because the lighting around it is much brighter than the rest of the scene and so the camera tried its best to get most of the lights in the best exposure. Therefore the sign has blowen, meaning too much white light. Metering off this would help but would make the rest of the scene too dark, which is why you would need more than one shot and blend them.