One of the most boring and time consuming tasks that comes with any serious amount of photography seems to be dealing with the large amount of files (and the amount of disc space that they take up). I try to keep two backups of all my images - at the moment I’m finally archiving them all to DVD, chronologically, but I’m also taking the opportunity to get rid of some rubbish and duplicates.
Often I’ll take a couple of shots of something and then notice a distraction in the frame, or I’ll increase the exposure time to get a little more light into a scene. At about 15MB a time all these extra shots add up and despite going against the “never delete your raws” mantra, hanging on to all these extra versions doesn’t really serve any great purpose, other than helping Western Digital stay in business.
The above image is from January 2010 (I’m about 6 months behind with my tidy up at the moment and my progress is constantly hampered by the arrival of new images which I’ll briefly scan for favourites and then ignore for a few months) and was taken on a frosty morning out with John Houghton
This was one of the last shots that I took with my Canon 450D and despite having been back since with my other camera, this was my favourite sunrise shot from this location - mainly due to the good fortune of the cloud picking up the pink glow of the rising sun, which is then also reflected in the ice.
Technical info: ISO100, f/16, 11mm, 1.3s, Cokin ND4 soft grad
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Posted in landscape, sunrises.
Tagged with canon 450d, clouds, cokin, filter, sunrise.
Another old one. This time from October 2009, taken with the Canon 450D and the Sigma 18-200 lens.
When I took this I stacked the Cokin ND4 and ND8 grads so that the water in the foreground would be smooth and bright and the light from the setting sun would be correctly exposed. I didn’t really like the result when viewed “in camera” though so I didn’t carry on. On reviewing the images I changed my mind - it might not have been an entirely faithful reproduction but the result was quite striking.
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Posted in filters, sunsets.
Tagged with canon 450d, cokin, cossington, leicestershire, nd4, nd8, sigma 18-200.
A couple of old shots again today, as I continue working though last year’s images with a view to making some of the better ones available as prints (and just generally sharing some of the others that had been languishing on my hard drive).
These were both taken on an overcast afternoon on a footpath just outside Brocks Hill Country Park in Oadby, a few days after I’d got my Sigma 10-20 wide angle lens. I find it hard to ignore the combination of crops, tractor tracks and trees and many of my images from this time were similar to this, as I tried to find a composition I liked (and I imagine there will be a few this year also).
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Posted in landscape, trees.
Tagged with cokin, crops, leicestershire, nd grad, sigma 10-20, tree.
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It was about an hour before sunset when we arrived at this location, and the light had just taken on the golden hue we had hoped for. After a bit of wandering around trying to find somewhere to make the most of the light I settled on a nicely constructed platform that was probably intended for fishing and took a couple of shots of the scene above. It was quite pleasant, but a bit bright and there was no interesting foreground to speak of so, as I had a bit of time before sunset, I thought I’d give the Cokin P151 - Gradual Fog 2 filter a try.
I popped the camera into Live View mode and slid the fog filter into the P-Series holder. The fog filter is graduated - foggy at the top and clear and the bottom, fading gently between the two states - and using Live View enabled me to see accurately where the effect was going to begin. If the effect started too low or too high in the picture it wouldn’t look natural.
This was the shot as it came out of the camera…
I liked the effect but found it a little too bright and unrealistic so I just made some minor curve adjustments to improve the overall balance.
Posted in filters, landscape, sunsets, water.
Tagged with cokin, filter, fog, print, sunset.
There, I’ve said it. It’s probably incredibly unfashionable in this age of digital - in fact I often see people on forums etc discussing selling their grad filters because they have abandoned them in favour of exposure blending - but they are currently my preferred method of attempting to balance exposures.
An ND (Neutral Density) grad (Graduated) filter is basically just a piece of plastic that is dark at one end and clear at the other - the dark part of the filter is positioned over the lighter portion of the scene, reducing the light variation (dynamic range) of the scene so that it can be captured without any loss of detail.
Drawbacks
As with other methods used to make your camera faithfully reproduce a scene with a wider dynamic range than it is capable of, ND grads certainly have their drawbacks:-
- The line between the clear and dark parts of the filter is a straight one (albeit with a slight fade/graduation to make it less noticeable). Rarely will a scene have a simple, straight line transition between dark and light so you end up having to compromise and perhaps hide the transition somewhere you hope the viewer won’t notice it
- Getting the gradient to start in the correct place takes a bit of practice - if it starts too low some of the foreground with appear slightly darker - if it starts too late the brightness of the sky might appear uneven.
- Like all lenses and filters they need to be kept clean - and as I swap them around between filter holders I have a tendency to drop them
With so many negative points, why use them?
Other methods of exposure balancing (such as exposure blending or HDR) require multiple exposures of the same scene, which realistically means using a tripod. I have a tripod, and I use it a lot, but I don’t always carry it - when I’m out with the family it’s an unnecessary burden - and sometimes I make the decision not to use it at all as constantly relying on it can lead to a lack of invention. A set of grads takes up very little room in my camera bag.
Processing time. Other techniques may only take a matter of minutes when you are skilled at them but if I’m taking an afternoon’s worth of casual shots I want them all to look their best with minimal editing.
An Example
These two shots, taken at sunset in Bradgate Park show the subtle but pleasing effect of using the Cokin P121M (ND4) grad. The first shot was taken without the filter. As you can see, the foreground is quite dark.
Technical info: ISO100, 18mm, f/22, 0.5s
The second shot (below), with the filter in place produces a much more even result.
Technical info: ISO100, 18mm, f/22, 0.6s
No further processing has been done to either image. As you can see from the technical info, the second shot was exposed for slightly longer (0.1s) which allowed more light from the foreground to be picked up by the camera sensor, resulting in a more even looking photograph.
Posted in filters, tutorials.
Tagged with cokin, filter, gradient, kood, nd grad, neutral density.
With Cropston Reservoir being the location of my first sunset shot, it seems fitting that it was also the first place I sat with my camera and waited for the sun to rise.
I’m not really very good at getting up in the morning, but with the sun rising a little later now (7:22am on the morning this was taken) I figured now was as good a time as any, before Autumn turns into Winter and it becomes too cold to use the camera without gloves.
I took a few shots before this one, with just the ND4 grad on, but the foreground was too dark - I wanted the sunlight to be casting a night glow on the boat. I popped to my bag to get the rest of my filters but unfortunately I’d left my filter wallet open and they were all covered in condensation. I had a frantic couple of minutes trying to get the ND8 grad dry and smear free before the run rose too high in the sky.
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Technical info : Sigma 18-200 lens at 21mm, 1/20s, f11.0, ISO100, ND4 and ND8 grads
Posted in sunrises, water.
Tagged with boat, cokin, cokin nd8 grad, cropston, filter, leciestershire, print, reservoir, sunrises, water.
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The day before I took this I noticed just how red the clouds were as the sun disappeared beyond the horizon. Keeping an eye on the weather over the course of the next day I thought it looked like there was a good chance conditions might be the same so I popped out an hour before sunset to explore some local lakes that I’ve ridden and driven past many times but never walked around.
The major challenge when attempting shots like this (for me at least) is getting the exposure just right. Even though the sun has disappeared below the horizon the sky is still bright enough to completely overpower the rest of the scene. I’m sure the camera could have dealt with this in one of its automatic modes in conjunction with evaluative metering and auto white balance, but from experience I doubt I would have been that happy with the results. The shot would either have contained a properly exposed sky and little else, or more light in the rest of the shot with blown highlights in the sky.
In order to maintain an even level of light in the sky and in the reflection on the water I used my trusty Cokin ND8 (P121) grad *. It’s ideal for shots of this type where there is a nice straight, dark line across the image where the start of the graduation can be placed. Using this filter allows a longer exposure time so that we can pick up more of the light elsewhere in the shot, such as the faint light on the reeds in the foregound. Once the grad is in place it’s always a good idea to double check its positioning with the DOF preview button if you’re using a small aperture as fine adjustments can make all the difference.
Before I put the grad in I’ll usually spot meter what I think is the brightest part of the scene and set it so that it exposes at just below +2EV - I do this manually by adjusting the shutter speed (but if you are using AV you can just used the exposure compensation control to achieve the same results). Once the grad is in place I’ll then adjust the shutter speed to compensate for change in light - so if I’d settled on 1/100s before the grad I’ll change it to 1/25s (even though the ND8 makes a 3 stop difference I won’t usually adjust by 3 stops initially).
Then it’s just a case of taking a test shot and checking the composition and the histogram (and keeping an eye out for blinkies). If there are blown highlights (blinkies) then the shutter speed needs to be faster - if the histogram doesn’t look right (usually not containing data in the right-hand 5th) then the shutter speed needs to be slower **.
* It’s worth noting that the Cokin P121 does give a pink/purple colour cast so it’s not really ideal for use during the day, unless you are prepared to attempt to correct the problem either by using Auto White Balance or by fixing it later in post-production. It is however great for shooting towards the sun at this time of day
** If the shutter speed can’t be slower - because there is too much movement in the shot - then compromises will have to be made with aperture size or ISO setting. A brief explanation of exposure control and stops can be found here - http://www.andystafford.co.uk/exposure-control-stops/
Posted in landscape, sunsets.
Tagged with clouds, cokin, cokin nd8 grad, lake, leicestershire, reeds, reflection, sunset, water.
By Andy
September 26, 2009
Another image from our holiday in Cornwall earlier in the year. I’ve always loved the rich dark colours of this shot and the gentle ripples in the water, which looks almost like black treacle.
The sun was low in the sky to my right when this was taken, casting a warm glow across the harbour.
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Posted in filters, landscape.
Tagged with boat, cokin, cornwall, mevagissey, P121M, reflection, ripple.
The light just after the sun has gone down can make for some really remarkable shots - Ok, sunset shots can be a bit cliched, but searching around (or waiting) for a bit of foreground interest can make all the difference.
If you are lucky and have a steady hand (or a lens with optical stabilising) you can get good shots at a low ISO without having to bother with a tripod (although using a tripod is recommended for sharper images). This shot was hand held as that is just how I prefer to take photos - I like to feel like I’m involved, rather than controlling a piece of machinery 
I like this location as the expanse of water makes for a great reflection on a still day but despite the colours being pretty it really needed something extra. Fortunately after about 5 minutes a swan started to come towards the shore.
Technical details:- Cokin P121 ND4 Grad, ISO200, 1/15s, f/16.0, 20 mm
Posted in sunsets.
Tagged with cokin, colour, leicestershire, reflection, sunset, swithland, water.
It seems I’m currently “very into” black and white photography - although to be fair, it’s something that I’ve always liked when other people have done it but never really bothered with it myself.
With the advent of digital photography I think B&W has got a bit of a bad name for itself - tools which can greyscale an image mean that it’s an easy way to attempt to salvage a flawed colour image (not that I don’t convert my own colour images sometimes also). The shot above however was achieved using a Cokin P003 red filter, with the image then being desaturated and the contrast tweaked slightly - which took about 30 seconds at most - the ideal amount of processing time when you’ve got a lot of photos to work through
Why desaturate? Why not just shoot in black and white mode on the camera? Well, if I was shooting in jpeg mode it might be a good idea but as I’m shooting in raw mode, when I get the images into Lightroom they will be red again anyway so there seems little point. It doesn’t really help for reviewing the shots on the camera either as the black and white preview displayed on the camera seem quite different to what I see in Lightroom. Besides, I’ve got used to previewing the red images now - once you’ve learned to trust your manual exposures it’s not that much of a problem.
Using an external filter isn’t without its problems though - the main drawback with the red being that you lose 3 stops worth of light so you end up having to make sacrifices in either ISO, shutter speed or aperture (or a combination of the three). Shooting at ISO100, f/11, 1/250s isn’t going to be an option unless you are taking a picture on the surface of the sun so I usually end up at ISO200, f/8, 1/100s - not ideal, but as an exercise in learning to take control of your camera in its manual mode I can heartily recommend it.
Fortunately many DSLRs now have the ability to simulate the affect of certain colour filters built in to their Monochrome picture options - certainly the Canon range do. These can be used without any loss of light, but only have an effect if shooting in JPG - raw images remain unaffected by them.
Posted in b&w, filters.
Tagged with canon 450d, cokin, cornwall, harbour, lighthouse, mevagissey, sea, sigma 17-70mm, sky.
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