Power plant at night

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j.brevard
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p.1 #1 · Power plant at night

First time shooting any night time shots 1dmk3 50mm 1.4 iso 200 15 sec exp. This is the only place i could shoot as they lock the gates at dark so i know it's not the perfect framing. C&C

Mar 29, 2008 at 06:44 AM

Bob Jarman
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p.1 #2 · Power plant at night

Very nice - I really like it, especially the way details are held in the strongly lighted areas and reflections.

Only suggestion - perhaps crop some from the right side.

Not familiar with Canon, is the MkIII FF? Did you apply any NR?

regards,

Bob

Mar 29, 2008 at 11:49 AM

j.brevard
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p.1 #3 · Power plant at night

no it's a 1.3 crop no noise reduction done. I was gonna crop some of the right but wasn't sure how it'd look since there is still part of the plant behind the tree line.

Mar 29, 2008 at 12:31 PM

j.brevard
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p.1 #4 · Power plant at night

182 views? any thoughts on what to do next time to make it better?

Apr 01, 2008 at 06:17 AM

perspective
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p.1 #5 · Power plant at night

Ok, I'll take a stab at it. First I cropped the image tighter to remove elements I found that weren't adding to the picture. I then backed off on the cropping and left some negative space on the right because the picture, when too tightly cropped is too dominated by the bright lights in the shot. I then decided the sky was too light and clipped the blacks severely using levels and then darkened the whole picture also with levels. I liked the colors and decided to make them bolder with a hue/saturation adjustment layer. This is the result.

PS. Almost forgot, I blended in a guassian blur layer (strength 7) using a "soft light" blend in order to give the overall picture a more dreamy night-time look.

Edited on Apr 01, 2008 at 06:56 AM

Apr 01, 2008 at 06:54 AM

j.brevard
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p.1 #6 · Power plant at night

i just didn't know how to really crop it the way it was set. Anyone know what will take the star effect out? or prevent it when taking the picture?

Apr 01, 2008 at 07:05 AM

perspective
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p.1 #7 · Power plant at night

j.brevard wrote:
i just didn't know how to really crop it the way it was set. Anyone know what will take the star effect out? or prevent it when taking the picture?

Hmm, try a polarizing filter. That might work.

Apr 01, 2008 at 07:34 AM

breycap
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p.1 #8 · Power plant at night

j.brevard wrote:
i just didn't know how to really crop it the way it was set. Anyone know what will take the star effect out? or prevent it when taking the picture?

'star effect' -if what you meant is the way the lights glow in you shot (kinda like a starburst in the sky), you can minimize that by using a large aperture opening. BUT having 'star effect' on night shots is actually a good thing! it implies that a small aperture was used and that a long exposure time was needed to expose the shot.

Apr 01, 2008 at 10:08 AM

j.brevard
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p.1 #9 · Power plant at night

thanks, i've never noticed it before and just didn't know if it was technique

Apr 01, 2008 at 10:56 AM

Alan321
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p.1 #10 · Power plant at night

The stars are created by diffraction as light bands around the diaphragm blades of the lens. Interference patterns (stars) are caused where there is a change in the angle between adjacent blades. The four ways to reduce the effect are (1) use a bigger aperture (because that reduces diffraction) and (2) use a lens with (relatively) circular diaphragm blades instead of (relatively) straight blades (because that reduces the angle between the blades) and (3) make sure the bright lights are against a less dark background and (4) use less exposure (without compensating by increasing the brightness in processing). Obviously, not all of these methods are always available or appropriate.

FYI, if the lens has an even number of diaphragm blades then you'll get that many visible spikes per star. If the lens has an odd number of blades then you'll get double that many spikes. It's actually double for both cases but with an even number they overlap each other whereas with an odd number they do not.

In this shot I would have reduced the exposure because the lights are well overexposed. If that made the whole image too dark then plan B would be to shoot a bright image to get the shadow detail and a dark image to get the highlights, and then combine them in software to get the best of both images into one image. Reducing contrast might also help a bit if you shoot jpeg rather than raw.

- Alan

Apr 02, 2008 at 03:06 PM

Scott Stoness
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p.1 #11 · Power plant at night

I like it. I would crop 25% off left - not adding to picture and try to move the horizon up a bit if you have more avvailalbe for cropping since the horizon is at 50/50.

Apr 04, 2008 at 01:35 AM


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