Lee Wiren wrote:
All of these shots are amazing Mark! But I especially love #1, I don\'t think I have ever seen a better shot of Punchbowl falls as this, and your Wahclella shot is almost as awesome (best one of it I have seen also). I would have never thought of breathing on the lens, adds an awfully nice effect. I also thank you for the info given to get the great shots, very helpful.
Lee
Thanks very much Lee.
Years ago (maybe about 5-6 years ago) I used to experiment with breathing on my lens quite a bit and had read that it was a technique that has been used for ages (I read it out of a popular photography magazine I think) but the problem with it was that I could not control it and the shots looked way, way too foggy! I kind of gave up on the technique for a little while until recently reading a post where someone was experimenting with the effect, but breathing on the lens toward the end of the exposure. Duh!!! What an idiot I am (I thought to myself)! I was fogging the lens and then hoping it would wear off during exposure! Really, really dumb, I admit. Anyways, I spent some time thinking about the techniques potential with really long exposures 7-10+ minutes, which I do a lot of. Also, with the idea of taking some shots with the breathing technique and then some immediately after of the exact same scene without the technique and then maybe experimenting with various blending... so some creative ideas came flooding in.
BTW, having said all that, with image #1 of Punchbowl Falls the fogging did little to create the atmosphere of that image. You generally have to fog quite a bit longer than a mere 1/7th of your total exposure to really see much going on in the shot. Try it and you will see what I am talking about. The atmosphere you see here is mainly due to a very long exposure (7 minutes) with fog rolling in, rain pouring down, and mist all over the place.
Jul 23, 2009 at 01:26 AM
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What an idiot I am (I thought to myself)!