There are many techniques involved in nighttime photography.  Star trail photographs are a traditional approach dating back to the film days.  If you think about it, that makes sense.  With the ISOs commercially available to most of us photographers, shooting the nighttime sky was not an option.  We simply didn’t have fast enough film.

With the advent of digital photography we can now push ISOs into the thousands and the noise levels are constantly improving.  And we can modify our cameras’ sensors to sensitize them to infrared light, something that the serious and most accomplished nighttime photographers do.  This provides us the opportunity to photograph both star trails and the night sky.

In previous articles I’ve discussed techniques for both types of nighttime photography.  In the most recent one I describe a technique that can provide both star trails and night sky photographs from a single session.  Here’s the link.

Exciting Nighttime Photography in 10 Easy Steps

One aspect I haven’t covered in detail yet is exposure.

Earlier this week there was a beautiful conjunction of the crescent moon and Venus in the early evening sky.  So I grabbed my camera, got permission from my neighbor and used their front yard to photograph the moon and Venus over the Los Angeles basin here in Southern California.

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It all started with kneeling in the mud.

I was with David Muench, Jerry Dodrill and twelve other eager photographers on a Mountain Light Gallery workshop in May.  We lined up along the bank of the pond just outside Bishop, California and aimed our cameras at magnificent Mt Tom, the dominant peak in the Eastern Sierra crest in this area.

I’d like to take you through the process of making a photograph from the images I captured that morning.

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Good news!  Summer is here!  And we’re thinking “Vacation Time.”  Now, you don’t have to be a professional photographer to figure out that you’re going to take a camera.  So the question becomes, are you going to take your camera that has been sitting around for umpteen  years or use your upcoming vacation as an excuse to buy a new one.  (When it comes to buying camera gear, any excuse will do, at least for some of us.)

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Backing up our photos is something we put off doing because it can be a lot of work and expensive.  And we think it’s something we’ll never need.

I got motivated to come up with a backup scheme about a year ago when I thought I had lost all my photograph files from 2010.  I had several days of panic and was able to recover most of them from a hodgepodge of backups scattered randomly here and there.  I didn’t have anything systematic in place and fortunately they weren’t my portfolio files, the ones I sell. (After it was all over I discovered all the files had inadvertently been moved to another folder. They hadn’t been deleted after all.)

It took a while to come up with the backup strategy that I shared with you in a post last month.  Here’s a link to that post.  Check it out.  I received some valuable comments with some good ideas from others.

Link to Backup Your Photos

It Happened – Duh Duh Duh Duuuuuuuuh

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I jut put up the November print of the month on the website.  It is a photograph that gives me a great feeling of peace and solitude.  It was photographed in Zion National Park, Utah during our photography workshop there in October.  It’s one of those photographs that felt good at the time I was taking it and was even better when it was finished.

I am proud to present “Gateway to the Narrows (2010).”

Join me on an upcoming workshop.  Click here for more details.

To see more of my photographs click here.

I’ve posted several articles on dealing with the clogged nozzle problem I’ve experienced with the Epson 4800.  In summary, I tried increasing the humidity inside the printer by using damp sponges.  This technique appeared to work but in the end was a really bad idea.  Here are the original posts.

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I spent the past couple of weeks making almost fifteen large prints for a client.  Image sizes were 13X20 and 16X24.  Boy, it was fun.  I’ve worked with these images over the years.  They were all 10X15.  But kicking them up even just one notch takes them into an entirely different realm.

Royal Succession (2005)

Even what seems like a modest step from 10X15 to 13X20 makes a huge difference.  There’s more to it than just the impact of a larger image.  Subtle details emerge that are are not readily apparent at the smaller size.  Colors seem a little more vibrant. The image feels more spacious.  And there are a lot more impressions that are difficult to put in words.

It’s difficult to really get the true impact of some images when they are small.  Granted, some images work best when they’re small.  But others beg to be large.

So if you haven’t done so yet, take a couple of your images and blow them up.  If you have a printer that can print  larger sizes, do so.  If you don’t have a large enough printer or use a lab, go ahead and get a 16X20 if you have done this before.  You’ll be really glad you did.

We lead photography workshops.  Click here to check them out.

To see more of my works click here.

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I have a couple of Lee graduated neutral density filters in my camera bag.  I don’t use them very much because I’m kind of an HDR guy.  But the past couple of mornings we’ve had some very clear sunrises and given the location of our home in the Southern California foothills this turned out to be a good opportunity to play around with my grad ND filters.

I discovered a few very interesting things.  I’m just going to provide a checklist here without any illustrations.  Hopefully it will make sense.

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I have a good friend who is a very fine photographer who hates Photoshop.  Not me.  I love it and will spend days and weeks on a single image.  But my friend hates Photoshop and wants to get done with it as quickly as possible.

So I showed him a simple two-step approach to Photoshop that gets you a long ways toward a great looking photograph.  And I’d like to share it with you now.

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There’s a lot of talk amongst photographers about shooting in the golden hours – around sunrise and sunset.  There’s no disagreement that the light is wonderful at those times of the day.  The low angle gives excitingly long shadows and the fact that the sunlight has to travel through more of our atmosphere means it’s a bit softer and a lot warmer.

So you often find a lot of photographers lining up for sunset shoots at iconic locations.  The bridge over the Virgin River in Zion is a perfect example.  I’ve got to admit, I love to shoot sunsets from the bridge myself.  Most photographers will arrive early and stay about 20 minutes after the sun disappears below the horizon at which time the pack up and head off to dinner.

I like to stay till I can’t shoot any more.  The light show isn’t over by any means when the glow on the clouds fades.  It’s just a lot more subtle.  As the light fades exposure times increase and when you get up to 30 seconds then ISO starts to bump up.

Why do I like this light so much?  Well, because there is so much going on.  Many complex and intricate things are going on in the sky above.  You end up getting a delicate play of warm and cool light.  Everything is enveloped in a quiet, soft luminance.  It can be a magic unlike any other time of day.

I was shooting on that famous bridge in Zion back in November.  If it hadn’t been for my two friends shooting with me I would have been the only one on the bridge.  Everyone else had long gone.  I was shooting HDR, 5 bracketed shots, something I’ve found to be very effective (don’t forget, the sky stays bright long after the sun disappears).  Each shot was varied by 1 1/3 stop.  Post processing consisted of Photomatix and a little Light Room.  Here’s what I got.  (You can click on these images to enlarge them.)

Watchman at Twilight

A few weeks before I took this Zion twilight shot I found myself in Death Valley on the Mesquite Flats Dunes, again at sunset.  I set up on this one composition and shot it for about an hour and a half.  Many people like the stark contrast created by the sun playing on the undulating surfaces of the dunes.  I like it too.

Mesquite Dunes Sunset

 But a while later comes the real show, at least for my money.  The play of colors becomes outrageous with reds, magentas, purples, oranges, yellows and blues.  And I love the forms and textures of the sand.  It’s truly amazing.

Mesquite Dunes Twilight

So for my money, you’ll see me out there (usually by myself) until I can’t shoot any more.  Hey, why don’t you join me and see for yourself.

Then and only then I’ll pack up my gear and head off for dinner.

Note:  All of the above photographs are HDR, not just Zion.

To see more of my work go to Ralph Nordstrom Photography.