In the course of photographing weddings through the years, I’ve had plenty of opportunity to hone my own skills photographing Fireworks displays. I thought I’d bring you my top tips for creating memorable images of this November’s great displays.

To successfully photograph fireworks you will almost certainly need a digital SLR camera, and enough knowledge to shoot in manual mode.  Apologies go to those who find this post a little more technical than my usual offerings.

TOP TIP NUMBER 1: USE A TRIPOD.

To create striking photographs of light trails as fireworks streak through the night sky takes long exposures – usually of several seconds or more. However good your handholding technique, without a tripod you will introduce shake into your photographs, so make sure to get a good sturdy base for your camera – almost certainly a tripod. You’ll also need some kind of remote release so that you can open the shutter without introducing some shake as your finger presses the shutter release button.

TOP TIP NUMBER 2: SET YOUR ISO CORRECTLY.

To maximise the quality of your images, set the camera’s ISO to a low number (maybe 50, if your camera has it or 100 ISO). This will give you the longest safe exposures, the lowest amount of noise, and the maximum recovery of detail around the bright highlights of the firework.

TOP TIP NUMBER 3: FIND THE RIGHT LOCATION.

Well before the display is scheduled to start you need to have scouted a great location. You’ll probably want to go away from the main vantage point for several reasons.

1. It may be too close to the display to allow you to capture the entire scene

2. It’ll probably be too busy and your rock solid tripod will get in the way and probably be knocked at the critical moment

3. You might want to also capture some foreground images (maybe a bonfire, or the stately home or whatever hosting the display). This gives a sense of scale and point of interest instead of the photographs becoming almost abstract images, solely of streaks of light.

TOP TIP NUMBER 4: SET YOUR FOCUS MANUALLY

Usually setting to infinity will be great. If you are particularly close, then find a lit object about the same distance away from you as the display is, focus once on that and then immediately put your camera into Manual Focus mode.

TOP TIP NUMBER 5: BRING A TORCH & SOME FINGERLESS GLOVES!

Cameras are fiddly beasts, and it can be difficult in the best of conditions to find the right button to change the right setting. Photographing fireworks almost always means that you’ll be out in the cold and dark. Fingerless gloves keep your hands a little warmer without compromising precision and a torch can be invaluable to shine on your camera when you’re searching for a particular setting to change.

I'll be back shortly with part two - and a couple of techniques for combining lots of fireworks into one stunning image. 

Dan.