Derwent Water

A couple of shots I took at dawn back in October. Would really welcome C&C. I guess they would have been better with ND grads - but still working on my husband. Think he would leave me if I spent any more on my gear within the next couple of months!

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First one has a striking foreground with the sky reflections, however the sky is washed out and trees to sides are too dark. Perhaps a polariser would have helped here.

James thanks for your comments. You are right about the sky and trees. I will definately put a polariser on my list.
I guess the polariser would solve the sky issue, but how should I deal with the dark trees in this situation is it something I need to account for when taking the shot or something I should deal with in PS? Sorry if it's a daft question but I have lots to learn.

Pollyanna1 wrote in post #2525617
James thanks for your comments. You are right about the sky and trees. I will definately put a polariser on my list.
I guess the polariser would solve the sky issue, but how should I deal with the dark trees in this situation is it something I need to account for when taking the shot or something I should deal with in PS? Sorry if it's a daft question but I have lots to learn.

I'm not the best qualified to answer this, but I'll give it a go as no one else seems to have. The camera's metering is not nearly as sophisticated as it needs to be to make a balanced exposure between the darker and lighter area's of the frame. As such it will generally give preference to the lighter areas of the frame (e.g. Sky), and try to make a neutral grey from it....and hence underexpose the foreground, in this case the trees. You could do one of 2 things to tackle this. 1. Take an exposure for the sky and a second for the foreground and join them in photoshop (not my preference). Or 2. Get an ND Grad filter. ND = Neutral Density. It's darker on one half and clear on the other. This will help the camera's meter to give a more balanced exposure. Some very talented photographers use this method as it's works. It's not perfect, but in my view less hassle than trying two join to frames.

Thanks James - your explanation makes sense and made me more sure than ever I need to invest in ND grads. In adition to a CP of course.
To be honest they haven't resized very well I'll have a go at adding another via the web.

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Hi Sue,

Unfortunately as a camera has oly around 5 stops of exposure range, comapred to our eyes at 3 times that (I think), shady areas tend to come out dark when there is such a strong light source. A 1 stop NDG would have helped here, as Duncaji has said and a poloriser would help reduce glar but needs to be used carfully otherwise darker areas will appear in the sky. There will be alot to learn if/when you manage to get these things.

The other method, if you don't have NDG's, is to take multiple exposures (you have a digital camera so take 3 or 4 in 1 stop intervals) and use masks in photoshop simulate the grad filter.

But neither filter method will stop the dark trees in these shots, the best you can hope to do is use Photoshop CS2/3 to try and pull detail from the shaded areas but this can be destructive, adding noise to those areas as it tries to find detail. Apparently CS 3 is better at this but I have not yet tried it.

Otherwise apart from the blown sky the first shot has a nice feel to it, I love Derwent water!

love the first shot, it's a really calming image, with some wonderful reflections.
Alan

One thing you could try is download a trial copy of DxO, take the shots in RAW and let DxO do its work in auto, its suprising how it can correct exposure. Its only doing what is stated above, but saving you the time. NGs are the correct way to go though.