Whenever you're trying out night photography for the first time, it would be wise to learn a little bracketing first. Exposure bracketing or "bracketing" for short is essentially takig four to five images of the same scene at different exposures. This is done with digital cameras.

Even though you are able to inspect the results at home in the computer, it would be best if you simply save the images as well onto your storage media in order to get the best type of exposure for that particular subject and camera setting.

It would be wise to simply do away with reviewing the images on your camera and when you don't like what you see, you simply delete whatever images you capture. It should be assumed that what you see on your LCD screen is going to be different from your monitor at home. So how do you start out with exposure bracketing? Read on to find out.

If you have a spot meter available and are able to meter different areas of your subject, you could simply get a general meter reading and then use that as a starting off point. If you are well-experienced in using a spot meter, then you should be fine in getting an accurate meter reading. What you could also do is to simply  meter off different areas of your subject so you'll be able to adjust the settings accordingly when you're ready to take bracketed photos.

Whenever you are bracketing, you should note that the correct reading given by the metering device should be the shortest exposure. If the meter reads 2 seconds for a particular area or background, then the remaining exposures should be appropriately stopped down for each exposure. This process will eventually yield the best and most pleasing result as you'll be able to select from a few pictures out of the selection.

If you want a particular area to be exposed properly, you can zoom in an area that you would want to be properly exposed and then you could take a meter reading off of that area, zoom out, recompose the image and then use that initial meter reading for the basis for your bracketing.

It will take a bit of skill and practice during the first time you try bracketing out. It will definitely be a challenge but once you're able to get perfectly exposed shots, you'll see that everything will be worth while.