7 Tips for Shooting on Clear Days

In my last blog post, I shared tips for those overcast days when so many clouds come in that the sky becomes gray and blah. But what do you do when the sky is clear and there is not a cloud in sight? The sun is shining and it is a beautiful day but there are no clouds to add interest to the scenery in front of you. All is not lost. There are many approaches you can take to capture beauty on those bluebird sky days!  Here are a few tips to take with you. 

1) Minimize the sky ~ Make the land the story of your image by composing with the horizon higher in the frame. Use a longer lens and focus on a smaller segment of the scene rather than a wider angle. Get low and look for foreground interest to add depth to the frame.

2) Look for Reflections ~ Reflections captures can be a dynamic and interesting scene all on their own by creating layers in the foreground. Sunny days really bring out the colors and clarity of a reflection. Clear skies can allow mountain reflections to stand out. There is beauty in the simplicity.

3) Capture a Starburst ~ When the sun is in the scene, take advantage of those clear skies by closing down your aperture and adding a sunburst to the frame. See this blog post for 7 Tips for a Great Sunburst.. 

4) Focus on Color & Texture ~ Brilliant sunshine enhances the colors and textures of the scenery around us.  The blue sky reflecting in water will bring out the beautiful blues of glacial waters. Colorful trees, foliage and flowers are enhanced by the sunlight. Textures of rocks, trees, and mountains are highlighted as well. Look for these features in the landscape. Capture the gorgeous blue of the sky in contrast with the colors or focus in on the details and eliminate the sky from the frame completely.

5) Play with Abstract Shooting ~ Grab your 6 stop Neutral Density filter and capture some abstract shots of trees or water. See this article for tips on Seascape Panning. Look for vertical panning tips to be shared on the blog soon!

6) Explore the Forest ~  Walking through the forest, our focus is on the trees, lines and details of the land. Look for the light shining down through the trees or capture a sunburst coming through. 

7) Stay out for the Stars ~ While the clear blue skies of the day may not be as intriguing as a sky filled with dramatic clouds, a clear night sky is filled with magic. Don’t pack up with the sun, stay out and capture the incredible starry night!  Head over here for 9 Tips for Astrophotography Part 1, and then scroll up the blog for Part 2.

Next time Mother Nature offers full sun and clear nights, I hope you find these tips helpful!!

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Kristen Ryan is an award winning and published landscape and fine art photographer and educator residing in the Midwest suburbs of Chicago. All images are available for purchase in the Fine Art Store or by request. Kristen leads ladies landscape photography retreats in the Tetons, Chicago, and the Canadian Rockies, offers private mentoring and teaches an online landscape photography workshop, The World Around You.

Tips for Bracketing

One of the challenges in landscape photography comes when we come upon a scene with a dynamic range wider than our cameras can capture. The scenes where exposing for the beautiful sky leaves the foreground land completely black but when you expose for the foreground, the sky is blown out and white. When I’m out shooting my goal is always to capture all the information I can so that when I upload to my computer I have all the options I need for post processing. And this means capturing details in the entire dynamic range of the scene.

These days our cameras are capturing a much wider dynamic range and quite often we can find a happy medium where we can expose at the edge too bright where we can pull down the highlights and bright enough that the shadows can be pulled up to bring out the darker details. But sometimes bringing up these shadows creates more noise than we want in our image. So in the field, I will generally bracket my exposures to capture full detail in my highlights AND in my shadows.

To do this, you can bracket automatically by setting your camera to shoot a certain numbers of exposures at a set number of stops apart or you can spot meter for various tones in your scene (i.e. shadows, midtones, highlights). For example, you can set your camera to take 3 exposures each 1 stop apart, or you could set it for 5 exposures .7 stops apart, etc. My Nikon D850 has a little button on the front left of the camera that opens my bracketing menu and makes this extremely easy. Check your own camera manual to find out how you can set your bracketing. Alternatively, you can capture several bracketed exposures manually by spot metering to take a shot exposed for the highlights, then the same for the midtones, and finally the shadows.

A couple tips:

1) Use a Tripod - While you can bracket handheld, and I do at times in brighter light, a tripod will ensure greater success when you go to merge them in post processing. The tripod will keep your exposures identically composed and focused and avoid problems with alignment.

2) Check your Histogram - After you have taken a series of bracketed exposures, check your histogram to see that you have captured the full dynamic range. Your brightest exposure should not have any clipped shadows (clipped shadows are shown by a histogram climbing the left wall) and your darkest exposure should not have any blown highlights (blown highlights shown by a histogram climbing the right wall). Look at both your overall histogram and the individual channels as well.

3) Turn on your Highlight Blinkies - If you turn on the highlight warning in your camera, any areas of blown out highlights will blink on your LCD screen in the correct preview setting. This is extremely helpful so that you know you have captured all the highlight detail of the scene

4) In post processing, you may not need ALL your bracketed exposures. Your goal in the field is to capture all the information you might need later. If you capture 5 bracketed exposures, you may find that you only need two or three of them to achieve your final edit. Learning what you need just takes experimenting and practice.

Below is an example of three bracketed exposures during sunset. The middle exposure of 2 seconds could be edited as a single file as the details of the shadows and highlights can be brought back despite the histogram showing these areas losing detail. I could choose to use this exposure for editing and disregard the other two. The darker exposure, however maintains nicer color in the sunset tones and the brightest exposure captures a lot more detail in the shadows. I am sharing my histograms with each exposure so you can see how they show my success in capturing detail in the shadows in the brightest exposure and full detail in the highlights in my darkest exposure.

Darkest Exposure at 1 second

Middle Exposure at 2 seconds

Brightest Exposure at 4 seconds

In the end, I chose to combine the brightest and darkest exposures in Photoshop by using luminosity masking. This technique using the TK Actions makes it really simple to combine exposures.

Hope this helps you capture the full range of the scene next time you are out!

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Kristen Ryan is an award winning and published landscape and fine art photographer and educator residing in the Midwest suburbs of Chicago. All images are available for purchase in the Fine Art Store or by request. Kristen leads ladies landscape photography retreats in the Tetons, Chicago, and the Canadian Rockies, offers private mentoring and teaches an online landscape photography workshop.

9 Tips for Creative Long Exposures

One of my very favorite things to do when shooting nature and landscapes is to experiment with long exposures   Anytime I have the opportunity to get a creative exposure of clouds or water, I try to take it.

60 seconds in Grand Teton National Park - using a 10 stop filter.

Here are some tips to help you find success when experimenting with long exposures:

1)  A tripod is your best friend.  I know, I know, they are cumbersome and a pain to carry but are necessary so that you can keep your frame stable throughout the long exposure.  Make sure your tripod is steady and secure. 

2) Invest in good Neutral Density Filters. I recommend a 6 stop and/or 10 stop ND filter. In brighter light and to get 30 second or longer exposures, you will often need a 10 stop filter. In lower light and/or an exposure of just a couple seconds, a 6 stop filter may be sufficient. For even longer exposures in daylight you can use a 15 stop filter as well. There are many companies that make Neutral Density Filters in various price ranges.

4 seconds at Natural Bridge in Yoho National Park - using a 6 stop filter.

3)  Compose your frame and focus for the desired depth of field BEFORE putting the filter in front of the lens. Once you put a 10 stop filter on,  you can't see through to focus and compose. 

4) Set the new exposure BEFORE putting the filter on the lens. Find your proper exposure without the filter on.  Then you can use a Long Exposure Calculator App to find the new shutter speed after you put on the filter. Usually you will need to max out your ISO and aperture unless you are shooting in really low light.  For example, say I set my ISO to 100 and aperture to f/22 and my base shutter speed is 1/80.  If I enter into the app a 1/80 shutter speed and tell it I am using a 10 stop filter, the app will then tell me that a 13 second shutter speed will give me the same exposure with the filter on.  So then I will change my shutter speed to 13 seconds before I put on the filter.  The less I touch my camera after putting on the filter, the better. 

4 minute exposure using a 15 stop ND filter in Grand Teton National Park.

5) Use a Shutter release remote. These are critical if you are using a shutter speed slower than 30 seconds as you must then turn to bulb mode. But even out of bulb mode, using a shutter release is one more way to eliminate the chances of bumping your frame and increasing sharp focus.  If you don’t have a shutter release you can also use your camera’s timer delay.

6)  Cover your eyepiece viewfinder to prevent light from coming into the frame as this creates undesirable light leaks. My Nikon D810 and D850 have a little door that covers the eyepiece. But otherwise, I would cover it with a black/dark cloth or anything else that will keep the light out. 

7) Check your histogram. Sometimes finding the right exposure with the filter can be a bit of trial and error. Don’t rely on the app or the LCD screen. Make sure the histogram is toward the right without climbing the right wall. If you need to bump exposure, lower that shutter speed, OR if your shutter speed is where you want it for creative effect, raise your ISO or open up your aperture. 

2 minutes with a 10 stop filter at Lake Louise in Alberta, Canada

8) Consider the creative effect and mood of the image you want to create! When choosing your shutter speed length, think about your creative vision. For really streaked clouds, you may need a 60 second exposure or even a few minutes. If clouds are moving fast, 15-30 seconds may create the look you desire.  With water, you may want to create a really smooth effect with 20-60 seconds or perhaps you want to leave more texture in the water with a 1 second exposure or a fraction of a second.

2.5 seconds in Kauai

9) Lastly, look at the other areas of your frame. Do you have unwanted blur in other areas of your frame…such as trees, grasses or other foliage?  If so, capture the exact composed frame with a faster speed so you can composite the two images later in post processing. 

3 minute exposure for the sky combined with a fast shutter for the foreground grasses. Shot in the prairie of Illinois.

It's a little addicting, so don't say I didn't warn you! Are you looking for filters for long exposure photography? Check out Breakthrough Photography filters!* They are the filters I always have in my bag!

Check out my online workshop, mentoring, or ladies’ landscape photography retreats for educational opportunities.

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