Heat wave distortion....your experiences?

[Wade Abadie]

I'm sure all of us have experienced heat wave distortion at some point. It is a pain in the butt, and can absolutely ruin an otherwise beautiful shot.

I'm curious at what distance everyone notices that it becomes an obvious problem? I know this will be subjective based on where you live and what you're photographing. Personally, the worst issue I've had here in Texas was when I was trying to snap a few photos of a group of deer at around 80 yards. It was around 10 AM and they were in direct light in an open field....but the heat distortion was absolutely horrendous! I eventually gave up and just moved on.

What are your heat wave distortion "horror stories"? (I would love to hear Steve's answer to this question....as I'm sure with his vast experience, he has at least one story of heat waves ruining a potentially awesome shot)

 

[JANuser]

The worst I’ve seen tend to be hot summer afternoons, or evenings near water, anything more than 10 feet away over or near the water was ruined by the distortion cased by high humidity. If I know it’s going to be a hot day and I’m shootings near water I try to shoot in the morning whenever possible.

 

[Warren D]

I've had heat wave issues just about everywhere under almost every weather condition. Recently, the warmer water of the large river gave off heat waves in the 10 degree cooler air. It was bad at water level from about 25 feet on out. As elevation above the water increased, I could get farther out, ie, osprey flying overhead at 100 feet were mostly effect free. I've had the heat waves while shooting trains on a 33 degree day with snow covered ground, but the sun had been out.
How bad depends on the temperature differential which depends on sun angle, cloud cover, type of ground cover, air temp, ground temp, dew point and humidity to name a few

 

[Hermann]

Heat distortion? It's just not funny. And it's hard to avoid on sunny days later in the morning and during the day until the late afternoon, especially if you're shooting at longer distances. Even on bright cloudy days results are more often than not horrible.

Take that Musk Oxen: Shot on a cool, bright day at a distance. That was the best out of a series of 100+ shots. Getting closer was no option. Musk Oxen can be, shall we say, a bit "unfriendly" if approached to close:

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[Warren D]

Something I stumbled on recently is to run a shot affected by "atmospherics" thru Topaz Sharpen AI. I was looking for a way to salvage an otherwise good shot that was affected by heat waves (though not horribly) and decided to give it a try. Using the "Stabilize" selection I was pleasantly surprized when the final shot appeared very normal looking. This was for internet use but still remarkable considering what the original looked like. I've tried it on other shots similarly affected with varying results but it does seem to help.

 

[StefanSC]

What are your heat wave distortion "horror stories"?

My usual "heat wave distortion horror story" involve not the sun but my car.

Sometimes it happens that I run across some interesting subjects that would scatter at the sight of a human but would gladly ignore a car .
If I get carried away and start shooting right away, most of my shots will be ruined due to distortion caused by the heat emanated from the car's engine.

So I usually take 5-10 minutes to let the engine cool down, allowing the subjects to get back to their rutine and then shoot.

Funny enough, the backseat passangers have no such issues.

 

[gordon_g]

Whats amazing to me is when you look though the lens and it looks good but you take the photo and it horrible... the first year I was learning Im like what am I doing wrong... I cant be that far off on my focus.... when I realized what was really happening Im like man that was really dumb.... apparently I just needed the to be harder with the rock to put it all together... DUH...

 

[Callie]

We are all just helpless in the clutches of the heat distortion monster. Steve has a write-up in chapter 10 in his Secrets of the Nikon AF system. There is little I can do but just don't shoot for if I shoot, I hate it. Temp here can be 37 C @10:00 and in the Kalahari, day temps of 40-45C in summer are image killers. And strangely, I normally see stuff that is never to be repeated in such light. Here is a robbery, the fish eagle robbed the marabou stork of it barbel and the honey badger mauled the leopard tortoise T=10:52). Both horrible light and distortion!

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