Multiple Exposure with the Nikon D200

I went on a mini-field trip yesterday with a friend, and discovered a function in my Nikon D200 that was hitherto unknown to me. (Hands up how many of you use "hitherto" on a regular basis?)

Okay, technically this function wasn't unknown to me as I knew it was in there, I'd just never used it before and never purposefully went looking for it. (Listen? Can you hear it? The chorus of "read the #$%^ing manual!" from the camera club guys. Can't hear it? Me neither.) So I went spelunking into the depths of my camera menu and found this little jewel.

It's called Multiple Exposure, and with Freeman as my guide and mentor, I gave it a whirl. The camera automatically divides the exposure after you enter how many multiple exposures you want - choose 10 for example, and it will give 1/10th the amount of light you need for each shot so that the finished shot will be accurate and balanced. How cool is that?

What do you think? I like the sort of expressionistic, watercolour quality to the photos. Or maybe I'm just full of hooey.

I tried different objects with varying degrees of detail - a brass jar with silver embossed figures, a firepit surrounded by leaves, a painted votive candle holder, a hummingbird feeder...


It was an interesting experiment and I learned a certain degree of control is necessary for each exposure, but it was fun to try something different. My method was to take the first shot dead centre, then move a few shots to the right, go back to the middle and then take the remaining shots to the right. Others may move deliberately from left to right, but I wanted control over where the image was centred in the shot. I have no idea if there's a right or wrong way to do this, so I just dove in.

And for the traditionalists in the crowd, some corn husks. Plain, old, one-exposured corn husks.

Oh oh. I just discovered the Image Overlay function...it even gives a preview in camera. Whoo hoo, I heart my Nikon!