Anyone have experience shooting fireworks?

[David Lavender]

With Independence Day rapidly approaching in the States, I'm sure a lot of rookie 7D users (like myself) will be trying to shoot their first fireworks display. I'm open to any and all advice. I'll have two cameras (and two operators) on hand. I'm curious to know if anyone has hands-on experience for the best settings. I'm specifically wondering things like:

- 24p or 60p? It'd be nice to have the option to go into slow-mo, but I'm not sure what looks best for fireworks.

- How far would you dare push the ISO? We'll have a few fast-ish lenses (1.8, 2.8, various lengths), and we'll be in a somewhat rural setting without too much light pollution (small town Hawaii).

- Building on the last one, with the 180-degree rule deciding the shutter speed, should I aim for the lenses' sweet spots in aperture, or just get them as wide open as possible to keep the ISO low?

- How realistic is it to hope to get shots of people's faces being illuminated by the fireworks?

[Andrew Waite]

Natalie + Mark | Basque Wedding Highlights on Vimeo

I had the opportunity to shoot some fireworks at a recent wedding. They put on quite the show as it lasted about 10 minutes. You can check out the results in the video. As I recall we shot it with a 7D and 5D at both 640 and 1250 ISO at 30 shutter speed in 24P mode. The 7D had the Tokina 11-16 at 2.8 and the 5D had the 70-200 2.8L IS at 2.8. I think they turned out quite well, what do you think?

[Jon Fairhurst]

David,

I was thinking of posting a similar thread (but in the 5D2 area) for stills. If you don't mind, I won't hijack your thread, but I'll "sidecar". Any tips on exposure durations, lenses, filters and anything else for video - and photos - could be helpful.

In fact, with photos, I believe that some do long exposures - and double exposures to combine lots of individual fireworks into one massive scene.