Sunsets

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Cree Native

Cree Native

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I am new to sunset photography. This is my latest and don't like exposure. Were should I be metering for these shots. The sky or the water or elsewhere. This was shot with a Nikon D3500 F11 and spd 1/125. White balance set to cloudy. Metered on area just below the sun setting. Camera on Aperture Priority and Spot focus and Matrix metering.
HELP
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Scenes like these have a lot of dynamic range, meaning you're probably not going to get what you want straight from the camera. When you say you don't like the exposure, what about it don't you like? The color balance looks ok, and the sky looks ok so is it the dark water you don't like?
You could brighten up the water in post processing, a little Nikon D-Light would help, as would shadows/highlights in Photoshop. You could also adjust the dark tones in Lightroom. If you want it to look better out of camera, you are into using split neutral density filters. When properly selected as to amount, (1 stop, 2 stop, etc) and properly aligned, they will darken the sky which enables you to increase exposure thereby brightening up the water.
 
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I always bracket my exposure manually for these type of shots. sometimes 3 exposures 2 stops apart, other times 5 exposures 1 stop apart. Then I process them in HDR sofware (Oloneo at the moment) taking care not to go over the top.

I've had success with this even hand held with no stabilisation available on my kit. Set highest speed burst, check that the longest exposure is not under the shutter speed you can hand hold, brace yourself if you can and go for it

Examples - had to post 3 times as I can't see how to insert 3 images!

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I'm not really happy with the darkness of the shot. If I meter on the darker water was thinking it might lighten it but you make a good point Post adjustments make sense. I'm just starting to get into photography seriously so I have a lot to learn. Thanks for the suggestions.
 
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As said above, you have a limited dynamic range that you can capture in a high dynamic scene like a sunset. So, you need to choose what is important to you and how you want the scene to look. With sunsets, I shoot manually and adjust accordingly. I also know that you cannot recover blown highlights, so be careful that you do not unintentionally blow them out. Sometimes it is okay to loose some highlights, but try to do so knowingly and not by accident. Having said that, preserving highlights may cause you to have deep shadows that might be noisy and possibly lose detail. So, unless you are going to shoot several images and try HDR, you are going to have to give up something on one end or the other. If you enjoy post processing, take some test images and see how much highlight recovery you have with your set-up. I personally would rather recover highlights than lighten up shadows, but it will depend from scene to scene, and others may prefer other techniques.

Regarding your above image, I do not find the shadows to be that big of an issue. It is a sunset scene and having silhouettes seems appropriate to me. But, everybody has their own vision of how they want an image to look. Just make sure that your vision is achievable with the technology at hand.

Good luck,

--Ken
 
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OK.. I'm a little slow on the uptake. You're right with what you said. I am working on too many pictures right now and got confused with something else. I'm sorry, I'll work with this.. And again thanks for letting me post. I'll check back with more pictures going forward.. Great Site
 
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Since you're not happy with the water you have a couple of options.
1) A good piece of gear to have is a neutral density filter that you can place over the top half of the front element of the lens to darken the sky. It works like putting dark glasses over the sky. When you darken the sky like that you can then increase exposure of the entire scene without blowing the highlights in the sky so bright that it becomes just a white blob with no detail in it. That way your water is lighter.
2) Second option is what I did here. In Photoshop I selected only the water and lightened that up without touching the rest. This is a very rough effort to illustrate, but would otherwise require patience and work in post processing to make it look perfect, but it is possible.

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Thanks.. I actually like that a little better, and I'm going to work more with post picture work.
Leads to another question.. My work is strictly hobby work not professional. Can you recommend a particular software? I've tried photoshop but can't justify the expense right now. I use a Mac computer and right now using their software that came on the computer. Can't do just one area like you did.
 
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Cree Native said:
Thanks.. I actually like that a little better, and I'm going to work more with post picture work.
Leads to another question.. My work is strictly hobby work not professional. Can you recommend a particular software? I've tried photoshop but can't justify the expense right now. I use a Mac computer and right now using their software that came on the computer. Can't do just one area like you did.
Click to expand...
I'm not familiar with all the software out there. Some folks use Photoshop Elements, which is probably a cheaper, scaled-down version of Photoshop. Many folks use Lightroom, also by Adobe, and is a lot less expensive than Photoshop.
 
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Rassie said:
Since you're not happy with the water you have a couple of options.
1) A good piece of gear to have is a neutral density filter that you can place over the top half of the front element of the lens to darken the sky. It works like putting dark glasses over the sky. When you darken the sky like that you can then increase exposure of the entire scene without blowing the highlights in the sky so bright that it becomes just a white blob with no detail in it. That way your water is lighter.
2) Second option is what I did here. In Photoshop I selected only the water and lightened that up without touching the rest. This is a very rough effort to illustrate, but would otherwise require patience and work in post processing to make it look perfect, but it is possible.
Click to expand...
Good post.

I'd also add option 3) Process the image as a High Dynamic Range (HDR) photo by shooting an exposure bracketed sequence in the field and then combining the images for best shadow and highlight detail in any of a number of photo editing tools.
 
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Cree Native said:
I am new to sunset photography. This is my latest and don't like exposure. Were should I be metering for these shots. The sky or the water or elsewhere. This was shot with a Nikon D3500 F11 and spd 1/125. White balance set to cloudy. Metered on area just below the sun setting. Camera on Aperture Priority and Spot focus and Matrix metering.
HELPView attachment 13624
Click to expand...
In Steve’s book on “Metering/Exposure” he has a page near the end of the book where he addresses sunrises/sunsets. He recommends using “Center HiLite” for AF. He recommends composing close to, but not including the sun (then zero out the meter), recompose for desired composition. Then take picture and adjust Exposure Compensation for desired effect (usually within +.7)
 
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Rassie said:
I'm not familiar with all the software out there. Some folks use Photoshop Elements, which is probably a cheaper, scaled-down version of Photoshop. Many folks use Lightroom, also by Adobe, and is a lot less expensive than Photoshop.
Click to expand...
Just bought Photoshop Elements 2021 for my new Apple laptop ($100), it was the same cost for my Windows Operating System on my desk top. Needed to buy both because of two Systems. If both were the same OS, would only had to buy one.
 
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