Film Shooters. . .Multiple Exposures

[gahspidy]

As someone who started off shooting with film, I can remember some fun techniques that are mainly associated with the medium such as multiple exposure. Multiple exposure is the process of exposing a single frame of film multiple times. Not all cameras had the capability of allowing this although modifications could be made, but most decent SLR film cameras had the option of allowing multiple shots to be taken without ever advancing the film. This would allow the camera to expose one frame over and over. I used to have fun with taking shots of the moon at night, usually using two exposures.
First, I would compose the scene that I had in mind but would leave the moon out of it for the first exposure. I exposed for the scene, usually a somewhat long exposure at night and alot of times using a fairly wide angle lens. Then, for the next exposure, I would mount a longer zoom lens to pull the moon in nice and large and then place it in my frame where I had left room for it in my last composition. Exposing for the moon was usually very fast shutter (approx 1/250 at f 8) to get a nice large and sharp moon. the rest of the night sky around the moon would record nothing over the first exposure so the scene would look intact and not ghosted. Getting the hang of the different exposure settings took some practice, but was always a very rewarding and exhilirating experience when it came out good. Of course I can do this with digital but would have to take two shots and layer them on top of eachother and erase what i did not want. . .creating a digital composite really.Seeing the actual negative with the scene and large well exposed moon in it with no computer work whatsoever was a very rewarding and satisfying achievement. Have fun with this technique, film shooters. Here are a few images in which I shot two exposures to get a nice moon in the scene.

[mjs1973]

Thanks for the trip down memory land Gary. I was a big fan of these types of images when you would post them. I have done this in PS, but I have always wanted to try it your way. We had a beautiful moon this monring. Maybe this post will motivate me to get out there and shoot it tonight.

[Grandpaw]

I remember my dad doing double and triple exposures when I was growing up. His technique was from forgetting to wind the film. Sometimes he would have the same person in a pictures two or three times. Ahhh, it brings back memories. You could actually be beside yourself looking at some pictures, Jeff

[photophorous]

I don't know if you remember giving me tips on this, but I have a pretty cool shot I took on some B&W film out in Utah a couple of years ago that I did this way. It's a lot of fun. It's a shame that you can't do it with most digital cameras. Layering different exposures in photoshop kinda takes the fun out of it. I haven't tried it lately, but I've been thinking about it since I'm shooting film again. Problem is, I'm using a different camera that doesn't have a multiple exposure feature, so I have to learn how to delicately cock the shutter with the spool release button depressed, so the film doesn't move. One day I'll figure it out.

I do have a question for you though. In these night scenes of yours, how do you meter? Do you have a handheld spot meter, or did you just use the cameras spot meter?

Thanks,
Paul

[Dstrickland]

I don't have any scanned to post but another technique is to use your flash and create ghosts. I would put my camera on "B" in a dark room and take a flash in my hand and fire it at myself, then fire the flash again without me in the shot and you could see the background through me. Amaze your friends.

[gahspidy]

Mike, give it a try. It's alot of fun. Dedicate an entire roll of film to trying a couple of scenes with the moon.

Grandpa. . .thats funny that his method was forgetting to advance the film. Great things sometimes happen from our mistakes . . .

Paul. . .basically for the initial scene I would just use the cameras evaluative metering mode and find it is very dependable. For the moon exposure, it was trial and error. I did not have a handheld or a spot meter in my camera so I discovered that dropping 10 -12 stops down from the cameras suggested exposure of the moon and sky would give me just the right moon exposure. It was usually something like 1/250 at about f8. I would do the same scene several times and each time expose for the moon with a slightly different setting, until I realized what worked best.

dstrickland. . .that is a fun technique as well. i have not experimented with that much, but I can imagine all the different weird images that can come out of that.
thanks

[Greg McCary]

Gary I have tried exposing the moon but never really nailed one like yours.:mad2: Multi exposing can be fun with other things too.

[Old Timer]

I know some people that use to keep a roll of film of full moon shoots in their camera bag. When they found a scene they wanted a moon in, they would whip out that roll of moons and shoot away. The trick here of course was making sure you loaded the moon roll properly so that the frames were registered properly. If you were careful everything worked great if not you ended up with the moon is some pretty odd places.

[photophorous]

I know some people that use to keep a roll of film of full moon shoots in their camera bag. When they found a scene they wanted a moon in, they would whip out that roll of moons and shoot away. The trick here of course was making sure you loaded the moon roll properly so that the frames were registered properly. If you were careful everything worked great if not you ended up with the moon is some pretty odd places.

That would never work for me.

[photophorous]

. .basically for the initial scene I would just use the cameras evaluative metering mode and find it is very dependable. For the moon exposure, it was trial and error. I did not have a handheld or a spot meter in my camera so I discovered that dropping 10 -12 stops down from the cameras suggested exposure of the moon and sky would give me just the right moon exposure. It was usually something like 1/250 at about f8. I would do the same scene several times and each time expose for the moon with a slightly different setting, until I realized what worked best.

Thanks for the tips, Gary. I've never had as much trouble with the moon as I do with the rest of the scene. For the moon, I ususally just use the Sunny 11 rule, which works out to the same as what you suggested. Of course, if the moon is low on the horizon, or if the atmosphere is hazzy, you have to increase exposure.

[Old Timer]

That would never work for me.

You realize I'm talking 35mm not 120 here. I will say I tried it once and the moon roll just sat around in the bottom of the camera bag so long I finally dumped it. Not going to work for everyone. It takes the motivated few.

[gahspidy]

I know some people that use to keep a roll of film of full moon shoots in their camera bag. When they found a scene they wanted a moon in, they would whip out that roll of moons and shoot away. The trick here of course was making sure you loaded the moon roll properly so that the frames were registered properly. If you were careful everything worked great if not you ended up with the moon is some pretty odd places.

thanks for sharing that. Thats an interesting approach. . . amoon in the bag for use at any time! One would have to be really good at loading film, in total darkness

[Old Timer]

This is an interesting thread in that I hadn't thought about this for a long time. The Nikon FM was the first film camera that I had that actually had a multi exposure switch. I remember using it for the first time along with the winder to do a 10 exposure shot on one frame of film. I set it up to get a person dealing solitaire. On one frame I had the hand going from the deck to placing the card down. It turned out pretty well all things considered.

With many of the earlier cameras that I used and was familiar with it was easy to do multiple exposures because of the two step operation. A crank or lever advanced the film and another lever would cock the shutter. More times than not the double exposures on those were unintentional between shots you forgot to advance the film and only cocked the shutter.

With the Nikon F and earlier 35mm cameras to achieve a multiple exposure you first had to wind the film back so that it was tight in the cassette than push the rewind button and use the advance lever to cock the shutter. You had to be pretty careful with this method because it was very easy to let the film slip during the process and end up with the moon in the middle of the building instead of over it.

[another view]

I remember using it for the first time along with the winder to do a 10 exposure shot on one frame of film.

I heard about this several years ago, and they said the easiest way was to set the camera at -3.0 for nine exposures but one more exposure really wouldn't be much of a difference. Handhold the camera and while moving it around a little, shoot something (anything). Really neat effect, one I haven't tried to duplicate with digital - it just wouldn't seem right...

[Old Timer]

I heard about this several years ago, and they said the easiest way was to set the camera at -3.0 for nine exposures but one more exposure really wouldn't be much of a difference. Handhold the camera and while moving it around a little, shoot something (anything). Really neat effect, one I haven't tried to duplicate with digital - it just wouldn't seem right...

I did this so long ago I don't remember how much under exposure I used. I know that I did it several times and varied my exposures with each but just don't remember which came out the best.

[GB1]

Yeah.. Did very similar things back in the 80s. I think I was more creative back then ! (Today I'm more about good technical execution, which seems sad.)

I just used my multiple exposure setting on my D200 for the first time on Saturday, but it was just a crude test. It's nice that the 200 can do MEs.

[walterick]

I used to do this when I was living in the San Francisco Bay Area. Here is a shot of the Coit Tower with the double exposed moon behind it. This was shot on Reala I believe.