Hello everyone, here's a little series of moorland shooting I did on Wednesday on Dartmoor. It was bloody cold, around minus two degrees, but luckily there was no wind to chill me to the bone like there has been on many full moons earlier this year.
All are taken using a 1DsIII, a 28mm Contax and the Nikon 14-24, all using ISO 800, a killer combination. Come on, what are you doing sitting in doors?! Use the most of tonight, its going to be a Perigee moon, 15% bigger full moon than any other time of year thanks to its elliptical orbit.
Moor Moonlight Fun II
The image is an exposure blend of 2 seperate images and three RAW conversions to balance the image. They are focus bracketed to provide a big depth of field, shutter speeds kept low to freeze the stars which I much prefer.
First shot focused on the sky to capture the stars and distant hills, next focused on the rocks to get a sharp detail and good foreground. Finally the sky image was RAW converted with different white balances to make an accurate colour rendition as the camera gets very confused when rendering accurate white balance in the dark. - 1DsIII, Contax 28mm @ f4 30secs
The Hunter
Using the 1DsIII and 14-24 this time the shot was looking towards Orion, placed over the main tor complex. Same procedure as shot one - 1DsIII N14-24 @ 24mm f4 30secs
Banana Republic II
This is a favourite evening shot, if you have a look on my vertical landscapes gallery at http://www.davidclapp.co.uk you can see the same shot, same lens. Again focus bracketed. 1DsIII, Contax 28mm @ f4 30secs
Home Safe
Stopped on the way back to photograph this wonderful set of cottages, black ice all over the road courtesy of the little brook. Many of the bends in the road would throw the back end of the car out whilst taking corners at 15mph, it was such a laugh, like a low speed rally. A straight shot this time with the 28mm Contax - 1DsIII, Contax 28mm @ f4 30secs
Moon Buggy
And finally here it is, the trusty moon buggy, a 1960 Morris Minor my main photomobile. I did it up from a complete wreck, I have nearly sold it again and again, but it has a lot of character and character goes a long way in my book. Again a focus bracketed shot to keep everything pin sharp. Contax 28mm, @ f4 30secs
Hi David - like the first two, and the cottages, and the Morris Minor took me back a few years to my student days when i owned a Morris Minor van (in the same blue) it was great - easy and cheap to fix (in those days!!). Like the technique of focus blending - do you use grad layers in photoshop, or do you hand blend? Cheers. Paul
It depends on what is needed, what ever produces the most seemless and untouched result, the focus bracketed shots are hand blended for instance because its the easiest and most accurate result, but may images are a combination of masking and creating selections to achieve the desired result. One important factor is whatever has gone on must be completely unnoticeable at 200%. I am a stickler for perfection in this area.
The Morris is still the cheapest car to fix that I own. I can still get most of the parts for it without having to resort to enthusiasts and specialist breakers. You should get one again, it this financial climate its certainly a good idea.
lovely shots. Really like the colours and feel. I sympathise with you over the cold, I was out a few nights last week myself, really, really chilly. I wear one of those fetching all in one angling suit things that Argos sell. Here's a couple of mine also of Orion that week:
Great clarity and renditions. For the focus bracketing, how do you deal with the overlap of the images from one to the other. I find when i focus bracket the blend area gets a bit messy at points
These are fantastic, I love #4, it's awesome! I've done a little night photography, and now I'm totally inspired to try more of it. Thanks for sharing!
I enjoyed your compositions, and the descriptions of your outing as well. I find the degree of brightness of some of the foregrounds, as well as the warmth of their color temperature, to look at odds with the starry sky, giving an unnatural feeling. This may indeed be your intent, but otherwise I think that a cooler foreground tone and less prominent exposure of the highlights would better give the feeling of it being a moon-lit night.
Icypeak wrote:
I enjoyed your compositions, and the descriptions of your outing as well. I find the degree of brightness of some of the foregrounds, as well as the warmth of their color temperature, to look at odds with the starry sky, giving an unnatural feeling. This may indeed be your intent, but otherwise I think that a cooler foreground tone and less prominent exposure of the highlights would better give the feeling of it being a moon-lit night.
-David
Its pretty much the way it comes out of the camera on a strong full moon like we have just had. I have increased the contrast by working on the images Luminosity, but this hasnt increased the saturation. Some people find this photography a headspin and very unnatural. I gave up posting these on NPN for that reason. Shooting at ISO 800 and at f4 gives a very healthy exposure indeed in full moon, what you may feeling is that you can't associate darkeness with this photography. Well you wont really. The camera picks up colour in moonlight, your eyes dont; there is nothing more unnatural than this fundamental problem to start with. I just like the headpsace it creates, its very strange light and it makes me fell very alive when I go out and take the shots, thats why I pursue it.
aFeinPhoto.com wrote:
Great clarity and renditions. For the focus bracketing, how do you deal with the overlap of the images from one to the other. I find when i focus bracket the blend area gets a bit messy at points
Great work
aF
if you test the lens properly you can adjust the focal plane so that the areas overlap in focus. This makes blending much easier and virtually seemless. Again it is subject dependant and moorland textures like this are easy to work around with well thought out blending.
