Long Exposure at Reelfoot Lake in Tennessee
See my Filter Stacking Video to see the process of how this image was created.
by Brian Stamm
The weather was cold, the waves choppy, and the eagles were a little inactive on our first day of shooting for the 2013 Reelfoot Lake Camera Club Council of Tennessee outing. Weather being the fickle thing it is I decided I would opt to do some long shutter shots in order to get an ethereal feel to some of my photographs. Several in the group asked me what the “stuff” was on the end of my camera. After showing several in the group the effect I was getting they asked me to tell them how I did that. This article is an explanation of what I was doing, the equipment I used, and how to get these types of photographs yourself.
When and Why to Use Filters and Long Exposures
First off I would like to start with the “why”. So let’s be honest sometimes it’s hard to take the best photograph due to a situation. Either the weather is not playing nice or the light isn’t right. Sometimes using a long exposure can save or enhance a situation or just add a different feel to a photograph. Many photographers use this technique already to get the “milky” shots of waterfalls. The principle is the same but it can be applied to more than waterfalls and with extra equipment you can extend shutter time by up to 30 seconds or longer. If you have a bulb setting and shutter release for your camera you can keep your shutter open till the battery runs. Long exposures are also used in star trails, headlights/tail lights for traffic, and probably several other pictures you’ve seen. Long shutter times can also be used to smooth out wave motion, cloud motion, and make certain items completely disappear, such as moving people,etc. This works on just about all DSLR cameras except Nikon. Just kidding, since there was so much ribbing about Canon vs. Nikon this past weekend I thought I’d add a funny retort at Nikon users here. I am sure the Sony, Pentax, and Sigma all have settings to do something similar. You can even get this to work on point and shoot cameras too though you would have to work much harder at it. See my blog article Having Fun with Long Shutter Speeds on my website where I go into more detail for point & shoot users.
Equipment
So let’s talk about equipment. Here is what I was using to take the photograph above. I used a Canon 5D Mark II with a 17-40mm lens. The camera and lens combo don’t really matter for this particular article but it should effect what filter equipment you consider purchasing to put in front of the lens. I will cover this in the section about “P” series filters below. I used the following filter components to capture the image above. A Cokin Z-Pro Holder with a 77mm ring to fit on the 17-40mm Lens. A 4”x4” ND8 Filter, a Singh-Ray LB Warming Polarizer (Z-Pro Size), and a Hitech Hard Edge ND0.6 (ND4 equivalent). I could not have gotten the picture you see without having those items. For those out there that might say they could do it in Photoshop instead of buying filter equipment I ask this, could you do it in 30 seconds? Listed below is a list equipment similar to mine that you would need to capture a similar photograph to the one above.
Most links go to B&H Photo out of New York because they are a trustworthy source to get your equipment and almost always have the best price. Also note that most items I’ve linked to are in Z-pro or “Lee size” filters if considering a “P” size kit please adjust accordingly.
There is good reason to invest in a filter holder type of system like the Z-pro or P series early instead of buying individual screw-in type filters. If you decide to buy a good set of polarizers, ND filters, or other filters you can get away with buying one of each filter and just buying an adapter ring for each of your lenses. So you could get one really good $350 polarizer and buy several $42 dollar adapter rings or buy three $200 polarizers for each lens you have. Even if you buy much cheaper polarizers, if you move to a Cokin, Lee, or Hitech filter system in the future you would have wasted money. The math is easy for me.
Stacking
Stacking filters is basically getting them all “lined up” in whatever configuration you want. There are so many different filters you can put in front of your lens. You can get ND filters which hold light back, polarizers, colored filters, intensifiers, softeners, infrared, warming, cooling, and sunset filters. You can have a lot of fun playing with them, though I would recommend “playing” in the “P” series to be cost efficient. In the case above I stacked a polarizer, ND8, and Hard GND in the holder (it only hold 3 in its current configuration though you can add more slots).
I have to mention that if your going to put filters in front of that expensive lens you saved for months to buy make sure your get good filters like Singh-Ray (1st in my book), Hitech, B+W, Lee, and lastly Cokin. You wouldn’t buy a Lamborghini and park it under a tree in the front yard would you, no, you’d build a nice garage to house it. The same sort of thing applies here, if you have good glass don’t put cheap resin in front of it. In fact I had a cheaper Cokin filter in front of my lens which is what I believe gave the image the purple hue, people liked it so I bumped the purple up a bit in post processing. The sky was actually just a dreary grey overcast color. A better brand of neutral density filter may not have added a color cast.
Settings
Now to the important stuff. It doesn’t make sense to put all this stuff in front then have a 1/1000 shutter speed at least not for the type of photo above. So to slow everything down as much as possible set your ISO to around 100 and then set your f-stop to as high as i will go, it was f/22 in my case. If your shutter speed goes over 30 seconds your camera may not fire, adjust your settings so it is 30 seconds or less or use a timer shutter release. This will help ensure a lot of things for you, first a long shutter speed, second low noise (also turn long exposure noise reduction on in your settings), thirdly you will have great depth of field which means anything not moving in your photograph will be clear and strong while any moving elements will appear soft and ghostly. This is just a rule of thumb you can achieve a different look and feel by adding and subtracting the amount of time, adjusting aperture, and ISO. With a long shutter speed you can walk through the photograph and your sensor will not see you unless you’re wearing a neon white leisure suit. You could however walk into the photo hold a pose for 15 seconds and walk out and you would look like a ghost. You can also use this type of setting to catch lightning strikes.
Things to be aware of when shooting long exposures
There are several things you should be aware of when shooting these long exposures. If you have any sensor dust it will become very prominent and noticeable in your photo. Just use a software program to remove the dust. Also make sure your filters don’t have marks or scratches or are getting water drops or dust on them, the longer the exposure the more they will affect the photograph. If shooting compositions with a lot of dark areas you will probably start to see color noise in those dark areas. You can try shooting HDR this way too and come up with completely different images as your underexposed images will show “more” movement as it will freeze the action, your properly exposed image will be in the middle, and your overexposed image will have the most ghosting or ethereal effect. Also remember you will always have to shoot from a tripod and make sure that it(your tripod or camera) is not moving, a tripod on a dock that is rising and falling with the waves will ensure nothing in the image is sharp and therefore will not have a strong element in focus to catch the viewer’s eye but may yield some interesting impressionistic piece of art.
Post Processing
While I like to do most things in camera there are few things that I like to do after the shutter is clicked. First removing any artifacts like sensor and lens dust, scratches from filters, etc. I can also choose to bump the white balance, color, or increase/decrease the highlights or shadows. Lastly I almost always sharpen the image even if I am going for an ethereal look, it will sharpen the areas of the photograph that have the interest and the “ghosted” areas won’t sharpen much because there is not a definitive area for it to sharpen.
In Conclusion
With the tools and settings you can change the look and feel of almost any scene and in almost any light. Filters will provide a means of slowing down your shutter speed on the brightest of days and they will help put even more creative control at your fingertips. Filters can help enhance the settings on the camera and can be used for effects like removing glare, balancing light and dark areas and can give you a photograph in a shutter click that would take hours in Photoshop to fix or duplicate. It opens up a whole new world of photography to you and lets you have fun out in the field. So get some filters and go have some fun.
Till next time,
Brian Stamm