I recently had a photo run with one of the stops being Valley of Fire State Park in Nevada. I had never been there before but had heard good things. I of course had to visit the "Fire Wave" and check it out. Here's what I got at sunrise. CC welcome. D800, 14-24, PP in NX2. Thanks, Josh
Been there at sunrise and sunset, not sure which one it lends itself to…. maybe sunset, but I wouldn't think after. Saying that I have never had anything but clear skies to see it in, which is not ideal. Nice capture here, envious. Rick
You got a pretty cool shot here, a nice view of the wave and some cool colors in the sky. As Maji mentioned, the only real issue here is the sun blowing out so much. An ND Reverse grad might have helped here with that. I would try now with post processing to underexpose the shot and blend in the sun area. I also might try brightening up the wave just a bit more. So darken the horizon and brighten the wave...
Rick Schump wrote:
Been there at sunrise and sunset, not sure which one it lends itself to…. maybe sunset, but I wouldn't think after. Saying that I have never had anything but clear skies to see it in, which is not ideal. Nice capture here, envious. Rick
Hey Rick,
Of course it goes without saying that getting cool clouds with cool colors is the best whether sunset or sunrise. But in terms of the way the light falls upon the wave area, I lean towards the sunrise being more my favorite time to shoot. But of course since I like shooting the stars so much, that doesn't stop me from shooting sunsets there and just staying so I can shoot the stars too.
Thanks for the feedback everyone. I did darken the sky and brighten the foreground in my edit, just didn't want to push it too far, as I'm not a fan of the fake HDR look. I'll take another look at it.
Joshua Warrender wrote:
Thanks for the feedback everyone. I did darken the sky and brighten the foreground in my edit, just didn't want to push it too far, as I'm not a fan of the fake HDR look. I'll take another look at it.
Hey Josh,
No one is suggesting a fake HDR look. It's just a fact that your eyes can see more DR and adjust fluidly in a scene compared to your digital capture. Generally speaking our goal is to try and reproduce what we saw. To use layer masks to blend exposures isn't HDR, it's a manual process to balance an exposure. So please don't think we, or for sure I, am not suggesting for you to produce any kind of fake looking shot with HDR.
Not at all Jim. Just relaying my own concerns about even approaching the look of overdone HDR. Not a fan of it and so sometimes I'm too cautious. I'll take another stab at it. Thanks again!
