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| Schloss Pottendorf 17mm, 4 sec, f16, ISO 100, ND 2 Stops Grad and Reds Enhancer |
I thought I would have some photo fun today. I Drove to Pottendorf located basically at border of Burgenland and Niederösterreich. I wanted to scout the location and do some basic shots of Pottendorf castle. The castle Pottendorf was first documented in 1130 by Rudolf von Pottendorf and was probably built shortly before. Originally romanesque gothic and then baroque especially the first free-standing, mainly late gothic chapel was connected to the main building in 1519. The three-story water tower had a nearly square courtyard. In 1737-38 two corner towers were added and the mighty Roman gate tower from the 13th Century. The castle belonged for a long time to Esterházy family....
All buildings are surrounded by moat... next time I will get my waders and will get even closer. But today wanted to get some water reflections and have fun with... second camera, flash, and radio transmitters . This is what I meant by "two birds with one stone". Besides taking photos of the castle I also was shooting myself from different positions. And all shots were triggered by main camera doing actual castle photos. Radio popper on the camera triggered transmitter on camera behind me or somewhere by me, this second camera triggered by radio flash mainly hidden by my bag illuminating me.
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| 24mm, 1/6s, f16, ISO 200, 580EX flash at 1/4 power placed behind my bag Picture slightly desaturated. Effect achieved, eye wanders from the castle to my face leaving ruins as main subject, me only as an add-on |
Let's start with the second camera i.e. the one shooting me. I have set it to aperture priority mode and manually pre-focused on the place where I would be standing or sitting, and set exposure compensation to minus -2EV. I wanted to have background underexposed and have myself lit by flash. I took me few shots to get flash power more or less correct. I started with flash built-in metering but it did not work as I wanted so I switched to fully manual and set it full power when it was till bright and then over time, when sun was getting lower, I kept going down to 1/2, 1/4, 1/8 of its output.
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| 70mm, 1/13s, f2.8, ISO 100, 580EX flash at 1/8 power placed behind my bag |
When I pressed shutter button, actually via cable release, to take main picture of the castle, second shot of me with flash was taken at the same moment. Sheer fun. Besides flash power and position I have not changed anything else while shooting myself.
Now as to real photos of the castle, I was still experimenting with new filters, mainly The Enhancer that affects reds. I have not used polarizer today at all. Then throughout the session I also played with sepia grad and of course my favourite ND grads - 2 stops. For some time mounted also Gold-N-Blue polarizer but did not like the effect that much. Real colours played better tune today. All pictures are from the camera with small Lightroom post processing but they are not HDR. I had few minutes when setting sun got through the trees and reflected in the moat giving me great light effect.
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| Pottendorf Castle 16mm, 3.2s, f16, ISO 100 |
I have spent by the caste around 4 hours and completely do not remember time passing. It was so relaxing and easy going, like scrolling down the park in nice weather with fresh air. People passing by stopped by from time to time asking some questions about what I was doing and where they could see the results. I gave out few business cards (new ones should arrive tomorrow). This is what I love about photography, you can disconnect from the world as such and concentrate on the frame and vision and wait for the light and time simple does not matter. Great silent moments, then you come home and have even more fun while going through your work.
Great location, will come here soon for sure.
Cheers
Jerzy
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