Gdynia, Baltic Sea Behind The Scene Snaps, Cont'd

Dębki Beach, Poland

Following up with the post from yesterday featuring Baltic Sea shots, I have received pictures of myself from Basia Kramczyńska from Gdynia, Poland, who snapped me on few occasions while I was fiddling with the camera.

All pictures (except two) in this post - courtesy of Basia Kramczyńska.

Even those few shots show that I love low angle and vertical framing. 16mm on full frame in vertical mode and shot from very low level produce really nice pictures.

Gdynia Orłowo, Poland

Picture on the right is 70 seconds exposure using 10 stops gray filter. I was quite still during that time, moved few times but over all my main silhouette is quite sharp. I really like this shot. Clouds are passing by, water keeps moving and I keep finding perfect frame :) And quite low positioned camera getting good details of the ground and as much as need of the sky.

Then the following morning, which in fact happened to be just around 6 hours later... we came back from Dębki around 10 p.m. and got up for sunrise at 3:30 a.m., so we witnessed one sun cycle.

I lost the sentence here but the point is, that next morning Basia snapped me when I played with the frame of Gdynia Orłowo Pier.

I started with framing and getting correct exposure with no filters at all. 

Normal day light exposure settings were:

ISO 100, f16, 1/30s

then I calculated in my mind..

Gdynia Orłowo, Poland

• 1 stop down - 1/15s
• 2 stops down - 1/8s
• 3 stops down - 1/4s
• 4 stops down - 1/2s
• 5 stops down - 1s
• 6 stops down - 2 s
• 7 stops down - 4s
• 8 stops down  - 8s
• 9 stops down - 15s
• 10 stops down - 30s 

Quite easy in the end. Results are in the post from yesterday http://jerzybinphotography.blogspot.co.at/2012/08/few-days-by-sea-in-poland.html

Gdynia Orłowo, Poland

Always divide or multiple by 2, you keep F and ISO settings set, just work with shutter speed. 

Then you get decent surreal pictures which you will never see with naked eye. Playing with filters is fun but you need time. Especially to avoid noise, you have to wait till camera makes second dark shot to eliminate sensor heat noise. With 1-2 minutes exposure it is not real issue but when you shoot night shots with 16 minutes exposure and then you have to wait another 16 minutes, it all comes to half an hour for one picture! I think the longest one I shot was 32 minutes plus de-noising. One hour for one shot!
Night becomes quite short.

Then I come home in the morning and my wife seeing pictures wonders how come that after whole night I come back with 10+ pictures only... what should I say?

Sensor heat is not such a big issue in winter with close to zero temperatures but in 30+ centigrades even 2-3  minutes exposures produce significant noise.

Hel, Poland. Shot with phone camera

In the afternoon we had session at Hel Peninsula. Great place if you take out of your mind travel conditions. However whatever troubles you have to get through, once you reach the place and jump into water all past problems are simply forgotten, you just keep shooting. Light is horrible and you still want to make the most of it. 

I dug out one shot of me framing wooden trunk tossed in to water (out of frame).

Hel, Poland
24mm, 1s, f22, ISO 50, 3 Stops ND-Grad Soft

"My Assistant" Andrew shot me with my phone camera. Setting sun is behind me but I wanted its light to nicely illuminate that piece of wood half flooded in sea water. Later on when we were already wet, Andrew beautifully posed holding my filters bag against setting sun! I am sitting in water and use filters and keep cleaning them wave after wave.

It was sheer fun and I plan to visit same locations in winter in January or February. I need some heavy shots. Even if I get them in England in November (planned trip) I'd still love to shoot Polish shore in that period.

Now I have to develop remaining pics.

Till next time.

Cheers

Jerzy