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Wheels, parachutes, cyclones and hot dogs, of course!

Posted by & filed under NYC & Boroughs, Photograpy, Places/Locales, Technique.

I am embarrassed to admit, but in my 21 years of living in Tri-state area, I’ve never been to Coney Island… until now!

The home to the famous Deno’s Amusement Park with its iconic Wonder Wheel, the Parachute Jump tower with its ever changing light display, the Cyclone, one of the oldest wooden roller coasters, and of course, Nathans hot dog stand.

Admittedly, not as impressive as I am sure Coney Island was in its early days of glory, it definitely still holds its own as one of the most recognizable historic landmarks of New York City. It also presents plenty of opportunities for night time shooting, especially if one is a fan of capturing the light trails, since after all it is an amusement park, a confusing entanglement of lights and moving attractions.

The general technique—the long exposure—is the same as shooting moving car lights on a highway. It will take some experimenting to get the exact light trail effect you want but just to give you an idea… Here is a very settle difference between a 1.3 second and a 5 second exposure of the Wonder Wheel… which can always be turned up a lot further to a 30 second exposure (courtesy of another Flickr user). So if this is something that interests you, check out How to Shoot Light Trails blog entry from a fellow photographer for a step-by-step tutorial.

For more of my Coney Island photos, visit my NYC and its boroughs Flickr set.

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