What would YOU do?

[jp4294]

Hi guys,
Today I went for a drive around and ended up by the beach and thanks to the howling winds, the sea was really messy and rough and I thought I'd try and work some magic and get some long exposure shots of water running off the top of this wharf/pier/breakwater thing. Annoyingly, I couldn't get a long enough exposure thanks to me not owning any ND filters so I went for plan B and tried to get some photos of the crashing waves. Unfortunately, the wind was blowing the spray onto me, so, not wanting to harm my precious (to me anyway) D3100 with salt water, I called it quits and hoped for some half decent shots. I put them onto my laptop and was annoyed by my lack of skills because someone more experienced probably could've pulled something cool off where as I'm stuck with these dull, boring photos. I tried my best at fixing them up in LR but I had to resort to B&W to get anything decent looking. I'm not saying B&W is bad at all, I just wanted nice photos in colour.

The colour ones are unedited while the B&W ones have been fiddled with.

ISO 100
24mm
f/4.0
1/250 sec



ISO 400
40mm
f/5.6
1/250 sec



ISO 200
36mm
f/8.0
1/60 sec



Now, what I'm wondering is, (assuming you get boring shots like these) what do you guys do with shots like these? Do you just admit defeat and bin them or do you try and salvage them and settle for some mediocre shots? Obviously you can't go changing every photo you have to B&W so what would you have done to these particular ones? (Please feel free to edit them yourselves to show me) Also, feel free to post some before and after shots of your own to show examples of what you can pull off in post.
Cheers,
​Jaye

 

[Lawrence]

Jaye
To me they're not as bad as you make out and I do think the B&W are better.
Some expert will grab them and fix even more!
​bookmarked ...

 

[fotojack]

Well, for what it's worth, I prefer the black and white shots. They have more impact, more character, more depth of feeling. Nice job!

 

[wud]

ISO 100
24mm
f/4.0
1/250 sec

View attachment 62653


I like this I would maybe use the golden ratio a little more - like my edit:







ISO 400
40mm
f/5.6
1/250 sec

View attachment 62655

Great



ISO 200
36mm
f/8.0
1/60 sec
View attachment 62658
View attachment 62657

This is also good. A few things - maybe aperture 4 or maybe higher, to blur out the horizon.
And maybe you could get a little more down, to create a more pointy angle?

I did a small crop, now it fits the golden ratio really well:

 

[BackdoorArts]

Some days you just have to take what the day gives you and be satisfied with nothing knowing that there's always tomorrow. Without being in the place with you I can't tell you what I would have done, but I suspect that if the salt sea was blowing up at me like you describe and my only reason for being there was trying to make a picture and not to capture something specific, I may not even have bothered shooting - which is more me admitting to a cop-out than it is any critique of what you shot.

That said, if I did bother to get out there long enough to squeeze off the shots you took I probably would have tried for the long exposure. Carry a plastic bag and a rubber band, cut a hole and wrap the camera and lens so only the lens front is exposed. This way the equipment is protected - just make sure there's a filter on the lens. If there's sand blowing and I was using an ND I might even stick a protective UV in front of the more expensive ND just to protect it as well.

 

[Horoscope Fish]

What I do in Post Processing is this...

I use review mode in Adobe Bridge. I look at a shot and mark it as 5-Star (a total winner), no stars (not a total winner but a shot worth keeping) or "Reject" (for later mass-deletion). I don't "do" 2, 3 three stars, etc. Why bother? I don't ever go looking for my mediocre shots, I go looking for my best shots. The garbage (rejected) I just delete.

Now that things have been pruned down to a manageable number, I look at the 5-Star shots, if there are any. These are the ones I give serious consideration to really working with in Post but I don't spend a lot of my time trying to "salvage" a shot. A shot either has that certain "pop" that earns it special attention, or it doesn't and it gets kept, but I don't pour time and effort into it.

All that being said, you might want to get accustomed to the idea that you don't get to knock one out of the park just because you want to. I wish it were that easy...


.....

 

[Rick M]

B&W is always a nice option and especially when colors are dull. Sometimes I'll take a blah shot and run it through Photomatix to see if tonemapping will yield anything interesting. As Jake said, sometimes you just gotta grin and bare the fact that it was not a productive outing. Sometimes I'll come home with nothing, it's kinda like fishing, enjoy the sport of it also.

 

[BackdoorArts]

Just for giggles I decided what might be possible playing with the color images. I used Nik HDR Efex to do some tone mapping (would have been better with a RAW file), which really added a bit of drama to the photo. Then I used Color Efex Pro to add Soft Focus, which gives you the feel of having the spray in your face and not quite seeing clearly. Maybe not great, but to be honest I like it more than I thought I might heading into the experiment.



BTW, you have spots on your sensor. ;-)

 

[jp4294]

Cheers guys! I love getting different people's ideas because they're so varied. wud, I really like the crops you've done it makes it look a lot more balanced I think.
The plastic bag idea is a clever idea that I'll definitely be using next time. What do you use for wiping the lens when it gets spray on it because after about a minute it was covered with spots of water (I think those are the spots and not sensor spots) so I tried to wipe it with my jumper but just smeared it which is why they're a bit hazy? I have a micro fibre cloth but I'm scared if I get it salty, it will scratch the lens the next time I use it because of all the salt crystals?
Does anyone have any input on Variable ND filters vs the square type that go in a holder in terms of value?
Jake, I like that last edit. Shows it from a completely different perspective.
​Jaye

 

[wev]

Just a little fiddle, but then I just finished a pint of Telegraph ale

 

[STM]

I would encourage you to get a set of ND filters. I have a 72mm set Hoya HMC ND's of 2x (1 stop), 4x (2 stops) and 8x (3 stops). I have some step down rings so I can use them on my 68mm and 52mm filter thread lenses. They come in VERY handy while doing outdoor portraiture where I want a very shallow depth of field to isolate the subject from the background.

 

[BackdoorArts]

The plastic bag idea is a clever idea that I'll definitely be using next time. What do you use for wiping the lens when it gets spray on it because after about a minute it was covered with spots of water (I think those are the spots and not sensor spots) so I tried to wipe it with my jumper but just smeared it which is why they're a bit hazy? I have a micro fibre cloth but I'm scared if I get it salty, it will scratch the lens the next time I use it because of all the salt crystals?

I keep my micro fibre cloths inside on a day like that. If it's constantly wet I'll use a soft cotton cloth that I keep in my pocket. Old cloth diapers work, as do high quality t-shirts that have worn out their welcome. I also keep a roll of Viva paper towels in the car. I've had opticians and guitar builders recommend Viva for cleaning optics and shiny new guitars as they are lint free and will not scratch as other paper towels will.

I would encourage you to get a set of ND filters. I have a 72mm set Hoya HMC ND's of 2x (1 stop), 4x (2 stops) and 8x (3 stops). I have some step down rings so I can use them on my 68mm and 52mm filter thread lenses. They come in VERY handy while doing outdoor portraiture where I want a very shallow depth of field to isolate the subject from the background.

Having purchased a set of ND filters I will caution you that the cost of a set of 3 filters in this configuration may only serve to frustrate you if you're really looking to slow things down. I find that I never use the 1 and 2 stop filters because, frankly, I almost never have a need to only add slow things down that much. I've found that on a fairly bright day even stacking all three to give me 6 stops is barely enough of a difference. Get a good 9 or 10 stop filter and a 3 stop as well to start. More times than not you're going to use ND's to really slow things down, and that's not going to happen with 6 stops, but it will at 9, 10, 12 and 13 stops.

Also, download the free NDTimer app for your smartphone. It will calculate the proper shutter speed for any ND filter added to a properly metered photo, and allows you to stack filters as well. So, if your camera meters correctly at 1/60s and f/8, that's 17sec with the 10-stop, and 2:16 with the 3 stop on top. And just so you get a feel for what I mean, if your camera wants to shoot at 1/60 in normal light, stacking all three of the lesser filters will only get you to 1 second. When you're outside, and it's even fairly bright, you're likely already at ISO 100 and f/16 just to get the 1/60s to begin with, so you run out of options fairly quickly. So go for the big guns and work back as needed. And even before you buy, download the app and play with it in different lighting situations so you can see what kind of filter would give you the shutter speed you want in each situation - that will help with your purchasing.

Oh, and avoid variable ND's like the plague!! I've bought and returned several. Each of them was fine to about 6 stops, but after that I'd get very uneven darkening across the shot, even on more expensive filters. If you want a 9 or 10 stop filter then get one.

 

[Rick M]

I'll second Jakes thoughts on variable ND's, some can also create patterns. I tried one for $100 and returned it.

 

[STM]

I keep my micro fibre cloths inside on a day like that. If it's constantly wet I'll use a soft cotton cloth that I keep in my pocket. Old cloth diapers work, as do high quality t-shirts that have worn out their welcome. I also keep a roll of Viva paper towels in the car. I've had opticians and guitar builders recommend Viva for cleaning optics and shiny new guitars as they are lint free and will not scratch as other paper towels will.




Having purchased a set of ND filters I will caution you that the cost of a set of 3 filters in this configuration may only serve to frustrate you if you're really looking to slow things down. I find that I never use the 1 and 2 stop filters because, frankly, I almost never have a need to only add slow things down that much. I've found that on a fairly bright day even stacking all three to give me 6 stops is barely enough of a difference. Get a good 9 or 10 stop filter and a 3 stop as well to start. More times than not you're going to use ND's to really slow things down, and that's not going to happen with 6 stops, but it will at 9, 10, 12 and 13 stops.

Also, download the free NDTimer app for your smartphone. It will calculate the proper shutter speed for any ND filter added to a properly metered photo, and allows you to stack filters as well. So, if your camera meters correctly at 1/60s and f/8, that's 17sec with the 10-stop, and 2:16 with the 3 stop on top. And just so you get a feel for what I mean, if your camera wants to shoot at 1/60 in normal light, stacking all three of the lesser filters will only get you to 1 second. When you're outside, and it's even fairly bright, you're likely already at ISO 100 and f/16 just to get the 1/60s to begin with, so you run out of options fairly quickly. So go for the big guns and work back as needed. And even before you buy, download the app and play with it in different lighting situations so you can see what kind of filter would give you the shutter speed you want in each situation - that will help with your purchasing.

Oh, and avoid variable ND's like the plague!! I've bought and returned several. Each of them was fine to about 6 stops, but after that I'd get very uneven darkening across the shot, even on more expensive filters. If you want a 9 or 10 stop filter then get one.

I don't use them for shutter speed control I use them for depth of field control. If I want to slow things down, I choose time of day.

 

[jp4294]

Thanks for that everyone and Jake that was a tonne of useful info. I appreciate it! Another question, what's the verdict on the screw on filters vs p-series square ones? Maybe you can't stack the screw on ones? Also STM, how do you control the DOF using the filters? Can't you just got to a low f number but bump the shutter speed up? Unless of course you wanted to capture movement or something in which case I understand.
​Jaye

 

[BackdoorArts]

I don't use them for shutter speed control I use them for depth of field control. If I want to slow things down, I choose time of day.

As in wanting to shoot wide open in bright daylight and running out of shutter speed on the high end and ISO on the low end, I assume, and I get that. But given that Jaye's original stated intention was that he wanted to do long exposures I wanted to be clear that, speaking from experience, having only those 3 filters available to use will likely lead to frustration before they lead to the results he's looking for.

 

[Moab Man]

Lots of great advice. Keep in mind though... some days the shots in our mind don't always materialize in the camera. It happens. However, those failed days can teach you so much.

 

[STM]

As in wanting to shoot wide open in bright daylight and running out of shutter speed on the high end and ISO on the low end, I assume, and I get that. But given that Jaye's original stated intention was that he wanted to do long exposures I wanted to be clear that, speaking from experience, having only those 3 filters available to use will likely lead to frustration before they lead to the results he's looking for.

I need to keep my shutter speed at 1/200 or less so that my wireless transmitter can synch with my strobes, but when I use my 180mm/2.8 or 105mm f/1.8 I rarely stop down past 1 or at most 2 stops. So the ND's are necessary to let me achieve both

 

[Scott Murray]

Here are my versions of your photos.

 

[jp4294]

STM that is a very good point. Scott, I realy like what you've done there, especially the 2nd one. Thanks it's given me some ideas to try. As frustrating as it is, I guess I have to learn to not expect keepers every time.
I'll try some non B&W edits and see what I can come up with. Thanks for all the help so far everyone
​Jaye