Infra Red Photography with a Nikon Coolpix 880

I recently purchased a Coolpix 880 digital camera. That made me visit and read up a lot of photography websites. One of the most interesting topics is infrared(IR) photography. Capturing of lights that are invisible to the human eyes.

So how does one know whether is the model of digital camera capable of doing infra red photography? Answer : Do the remote control test.

Look thru the LCD of your digicam and point yr cam at the LED of a remote control. If you can see see the LED light when you press a button then your digicam is capable of doing infrared photography.

How strong the LED glows indicates how sensitive is your digicam to IR. Unfortunately, the 880 is not very sensitive to IR.

Nonetheless, I still decide to try my hand on IR after reading some comments on DPreview forums. I did not owned any filters but I read using exposed and processed negative films will make a IR filter.

So I dig out some negative and cut 2 pieces and use it as filter. I take a shot from my room's window and turn out to be brown. I did and Auto Levels in Photoshop and then it look better. Here's the results:

Not too good as you can see. The brownish tint from the film still shows. I guess it is not dark enough. So i add another 2 layer of negative. Now it looks better. Here's the results after AutoLevel-ing and resized in Photoshop.

Not very sharp as I handheld the cam. I would need a tripod and get a proper IR filter. I will post more pictures once I got the chance to work on them.

8 July 2001