Castlerigg Sunrise - without filter
I have been visiting this site for 40 years and as I am now trying to learn photography, thought I'd try a sunrise. There is no HDR treatment and no filter involved. ISO 100 at f22 for 1/10 second has given lens flare (white banding not the starburst) loads of grainy noise. The shortish exposure was because I metered close to the sun as it rose.
Needless to say the raw file was a black silhouette with an orange ball above it. So there was a lot of post production work that i'm not sure or happy about.
I cropped to a "pano" type but its not a true panorama. Any thoughts or observations that will help me improve?
Also posted is an after dawn and 3:2 aspect of the same as comparison for the pano crop.
#1 does look a little underexposed though.
You are right about the overexposed feeling Karl here's a more contrasty version and also another photo of a different sunrise using a 8x ND Filter.
p.s. I'm no pro either, they sure earn their money!
That last photo I love, would look good on anyones wall
www.dcimages.org.uk
"A good photograph is one that communicate a fact, touches the heart, leaves the viewer a changed person for having seen it. It is, in a word, effective." - Irving Penn
In reality many cameras are outside their design zone if you don't use the appropriate intervention in the form of filters. They can't cope well with the differences in bright and dark above around 7 stops. I know this depends on model but as a general observation.
Our human sensors will cope beyond around 10 stops of difference as the brain is able to perceive and interpret. So what we see and the way that camera sensors work is different and we need to understand the tolerances and intervene.
I have seen some fantastic sunrise and sunset shots directly into the sun (non of them mine I hasten to add) and the correct filters are the key. Post processing dodging, burning etc. cannot render the same results in my opinion. An idiot like me will try though as it is my learning style. I'm the kid who poked his fingers into the fire despite parental advice lol.
Attached is another shot where i'm trying intervene using a tree to reduce the brightness of the sun......it still doesn't give the umph that the good shots we've all seen do.
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