Creating a Sun Star in your Photos

When you're standing in the woods and the sun is low and shining through trees, it's a great opportunity to practice photographing "sun stars".  Set your aperture to a small opening, say f22-32 and let the camera meter choose the shutter speed (use Aperture Priority Mode-AV).  And, of course, a tripod is essential for composition and to give you shutter speed freedom (SSF)!

Autumn Snowfall in Mountains

We were treated to an early snowfall in Southern Colorado; right when the aspens are in full bloom.  One word of advice, actually two, Neutral Density.  Use the ND filter (.6 or .9) to darken the intensity of the sky or snow on the mountains in relation to the aspens and spruce/fir in the foreground and middle ground.  Digital cameras do a great job of metering difficult scenes, but you can help maintain detail in the clouds and snow with an ND.  Be attentive to the sky even more so if the snow is lit by the sun.  

Change your ISO to vary exposure

In grand landscape we tend to photograph using aperture priority (AV) mode with deep depth of field as our prime consideration.  We start with apertures of f32, f29, f25 in the hopes of gaining control of the image sharpness from foreground to background (say, foreground flowers, middle ground and mountains in the background).  As long as we use a tripod, the shutter speeds that the camera meter picks will not be a problem, as long as there is no wind, motion, movement in the scene.  Often this is not the case.  One solution is to sacrifice depth of field, opening up the aperture to f22, 19, 16, 11.  The results in the photograph will be that there is less sharpness (depth of area of sharpness) in the background.

Another solution is to adjust the ISO to get more flexibility of choices in aperture.  We usually set our ISO for 80-100 in the field for grand landscape, hoping to enlarge the photo to 18x24 or larger.  But if wind is an issue, try changing your ISO to 320 or 400.  You can choose deep depth of field (f22-32) and get a faster shutter speed than at ISO 80-100.  Try an experiment:  Photograph a grand landscape, use your tripod, set your ISO to 100, set your mode to AV, choose an aperture that gives deep depth of field (f22,25, 29, 32), check the metadata or jot down the shutter speed the camera chose.  Repeat the same framing, use your tripod, set your ISO to 400, set your mode to AV, choose the same aperture, check the metadata or jot down the shutter speed the camera chose.  Compare the finished images at 100%.

Fall Photography

Our Fall Chase the Light Adventure was last weekend, Sept, 25-27th in Ouray.  We drove from my studio in Durango on the Alpine loop from Durango through Silverton, over Red Mountain Pass, and to Ouray.  

Our photo locations included Molas Pass, Owl Creek Pass, Dallas Creek, Red Mountain Pass. The fall colors are mixed:  Silverton is passing peak colors, Red Mountain (I give it an 11 on a scale of 1-10), Owl Creek Pass, grand views and intimate aspen forest scenes are "hot" (full of texture and golden aspen).

The weather was mixed, sunny, cumulus clouds, allowing us to photograph "cloud shadows" across the land.  It rained on Dallas Creek Road, so we spent time learning to use "point and shoot digital cameras".  We stayed at the St. Elmo Hotel in Ouray and reviewed photos on student laptops at the Hotel.

I was pleasantly surprised to see that East Dallas Creek and Dallas Divide were just beginning to change color.  I suspect that peak fall colors will occur over the next 10 days.   More to follow...