I had proper quiet session with Lee's Big Stopper - neutral density filter stopping 10 stops of light. I have already had 10 stops filter from B+W but it was screw-on one with 77mm thread thus I was not able to use it on 16mm lens with 82mm thread diameter, and there were so many situations when I really could have done better with such strong filter on really wide angle. I simply had to get one.
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| Today's end of the session shot. 16mm, 280 seconds, f/16, ISO100 Filters: 3 stops ND, reds enhancer, 1 stop ND grad |
The Big Stopper is really fantastic piece of glass. Extending exposure time to minutes during a day can alter photographed scene to something magical and mystical. I really like to work with long exposures.
So here's what I have done today.
To start with I chose so obvious and well known location - Lighthouse in Podersdorf by Neusiedlersee (Nuseidler Lake), that it would be difficult to find something more typical. The place have been photographed I think by every photographer in this country and millions of tourists just as well. I was after getting some different mood especially on grey and cold afternoon. The place looked so grey and dull and empty. With Big Stopper, this was exactly what I was looking for.
Like every strong neutral density filter, also this one adds some colour cast to the scene, so especially when one shoots JPGs, correct white balance should be set. With auto white balance picture will have very strong blue cast and will have nothing to do with reality. Setting white balance to Cloudy or Shade might help. I have even been suggested to set manually colour temperature to 10.000K in the camera. And this is what I did yesterday and it looked quite good. Today however I wanted to get really correct colours. Thick layer of clouds made sure light around me was consistent, I could say I was in one massive studio with huge grey soft-box above me.
I dug out X-Rite Color Checker and used its grey card to set absolutely correct white balance. First picture (with dark blue cast) was shot with auto white balance, and is... blue, not real colours. But this picture can be used as base for custom white balance in the camera. You simply choose the picture and set camera WB to Custom.
Next shot, looks quite different and very real. Actually you can see what sort of grey day it was. Now that I see in Lightroom, colour temperature was set to 11.250K with some magenta tint. If I opened it with original Canon software it would probably show temperature of around 13.000K or close to it. Somehow Lightroom always converts those values differently.
Anyway correct custom WB solves all the issues.
80 seconds exposure altered the scene to something you will never see with your own eye. I used long focal length to focus only on those 3 wooden logs and have blurred sort of misty water around then with reflection. Lake was quite calm today thus there very calm and steady.
Manual focus, prior to mounting the filter, once you put it on view finder will be pitch black. Sometimes with strong light LiveView might be useful, but not always, and bulb mode. Aperture set to f/8, ISO 100. I could have closed down aperture more to F/16 to have all of them in focus, but that would mean over 4 minutes exposure and I was more after colours test.
What is important here, I shot it with custom white balance and colours are 100% correct to what they were in reality.
Let's get something more interesting and different, I moved to small pier where during summer you can see boats and yachts. When you stand there you see this well known light house on the right side. Well, it is still there, but I framed the shot such way so first wooden pillar completely covers it.
I frame the shot without any filters, but camera is still set to custom white balance as in previous shot. I do test shot checking on correct exposure, and here it is. 1/13s, f16, ISO 100, focus manually set 1.5m.
With such focus settings and f/16 on wide angle lens you get all from around 1 metre to infinity in focus.
What horrible colours!
Now I calculate 12 stops down - 10 stops for Big Stopper and 2 stops for polarizer.
I already had 2 filters and I also added 1 stop soft ND grad to darken clouds a little bit.
New exposure was calculated to 4 minutes.
Unfortunately clouds had no real texture so all looks simply foggy. At least colours are correct.
The picture will not win any prize but test and exercise was good. With better light conditions this frame could end up quite well, there are lot's of wooden textures and lines.
I will play more with the picture later, perhaps black and white will work well. But if I only had some blurred clouds...
Was not meant to be.
And then miracle happened. It was getting close to sunset time. For literally 5-10 minutes sun broke through the clouds. I got to capture really nice sunset, and when I least expected it. I quickly changed position, recomposed the frame trying to make the most of it.... with filters and without them. This is always a good idea to shoot both versions.
Here's one without anything on the lens with auto white balance.
It is ok, but nothing special really. It was still grey day and I shot same frame so many times with better light and under moon light also. I quickly mounted polarizer and big stopper to transform same scene into something ethereal and shot few more pictures with times between 2-3 minutes. I also changed white balance back to Custom, and was able to record magic!
What a difference! 2 minutes exposure @ f/16, ISO 200, 28mm.
Light was changing constantly, next vertical shot I had to shoot already for 3 minutes. I was in a hurry so framing and compositions are not perfect, I simply wanted to capture the moment.
I did 2-3 more shots to be on the safe side and sun was gone for the rest of the evening.
That was it.
Early night, actually I should not call it night, it was roughly after 4 p.m., getting darker but still plently of light and now best colours typically occurs, after sunset.
So I carried on with tests, and now moved into extreme phase. Took off polarizer as it would not have any effect anyway.
Composed new shot for water and clouds with some reds and three wave breakers or whatever they are. Important is number three - odd numbers work better for composition than even numbers. With 10 stops big stopper I had to shoot it for 10 minutes! On top of that I mounted 1 stop hard ND grad to darken sky section above horizon. Here's the result:
Quite calming down scene. Good for printing in large format and placing on the wall at home or office.
Now it became too dark, with 10 stops filters I would have to be shooting for hours. But I still was after something, and I think I got it. This time I placed "only"... Lee Reds Enhancer, 3 stops pro-glass grey filter, and 1 stop hard grad to darken the sky. Still wanted long exposures in range of 5-10 minutes, and with enhancer wanted to reach more reds from lighthouse and rocks in front. It was actually getting really dark. Eyes did not see the colours camera did, but I knew what to expect. Lighthouse's beams of light started to circle and they where like cherry on top sweet pie.
This location by the stones, just besides closed restaurant offers quite different perspective. The key here is also ultra wide angle lens.
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| 16mm, 182 seconds, f/16, ISO100 Filters: 3 stops ND, reds enhancer, 1 stop ND grad |
With little help of filters grey and later blue scenes got some nice warm atmosphere.
It was fun.
Better resolution of pictures are on Flickr Stream under the link
When I choose which one is the best, will upload to my website. I did some clean-up recently. Perhaps you can help me choosing Picture of The Day. Let me know which one you like the most.
Cheers
Jerzy
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