Minneapolis Photographer Mitch Rossow presents daily photos of Minneapolis. Cityscapes, People & Perspectives: Mitch explains composition and techniques.

OK, this is from July 4th in Minneapolis, but I wanted to wish our fellow revolutionary brothers & sisters a bon quatorze juillet! France is, after all, the home of the City Daily Photo Blog, thanks Eric!

Believe it or not, I took this night photo hand-held with a telephoto lens. Yes, it’s the Nikon 70-300mm VR to the rescue. 1/6th of a second at f/4.5 and a focal length of 165mm. If you breath slow enough, you don’t need a tripod!

It’s possible that my former co-worker/mentor Mike Smith was right that if you drink enough caffeine, you jitter fast enough that you appear still. Either way, VR or Image Stabilization rocks!