Caveat - I've never worked a night shift, but I have friends that have in the medical industry... here's some of their pointers:
Make yourself a regular sleep cycle and stick by it. You still need the standard 6-10 hours of sleep - and you need to get your body into a cycle where it knows it needs to sleep.
Make your bedroom a place where your body will go to sleep - even at an irregular hour - heavy curtains for darkness, earplugs for noise, making sure that your sleep cycle is respected by your family or roommates - figuring out what it will take to get real rest is a big deal.
Showering and eating routines are just as important - rest helps your body sleep, foot and morning rituals help your body wake up.
Eating healthy throughout the day takes more planning - the lack of lots of options for the mid-work meal can mean you eat out of vending machines or scrounge whatever you can - that's not so good from an energy standpoint and can run you down in the long run.
Look for the good points in your work routine - even on day shifts, I find that my most creative points are often the end of my work day. My old boss used to peak in the early morning. Even on night shift, you probably have a best time to be creative. Play with the idea of scheduling yourself creative work at different times in the day, and see if you have a favorite time for that kind of work. It's probably different than what you are used to from a day shift, and it may be the last thing you figure out after you have a reliable physical routine worked out.
Figuring out how to maximize the use of your brain is always the trickiest, since it's pretty hard to measure. Doctors are always coming up with new brain information, too, and refining old theories - so there may even be recent research on it that I'm not aware of.
