{"id":1272,"date":"2010-06-20T08:15:58","date_gmt":"2010-06-20T16:15:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/2010\/06\/20\/photography-tutorial-moving-water\/"},"modified":"2019-11-18T20:45:40","modified_gmt":"2019-11-19T04:45:40","slug":"photography-tutorial-moving-water","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/2010\/06\/20\/photography-tutorial-moving-water\/","title":{"rendered":"Photography Tutorial – Moving Water"},"content":{"rendered":"

Landscape photographers love to photograph moving water \u2013 waterfalls, rapids, even water quietly slipping over a rock.<\/p>\n

When photographing moving water the primary exposure consideration is shutter speed.\u00a0 A very short shutter speed, say 1\/500 sec, can produce the \u2018ice sculpture\u2019 look\u2019 in which the water is suspended in shiny, crystal clear forms.\u00a0 This can be very effective and exciting.\u00a0 As the shutter speed is lengthened, say to 1\/15 sec,\u00a0 the water begins to blur.\u00a0 First you see little short traces of each of the drops.\u00a0 Then as the exposure lengthens to a half second or more the traces merge together into the beautiful effects we love.\u00a0 Really long exposure of 2 or more seconds produce a misty effect in which nearly all texture in the water is replaced with soft clouds of light.<\/p>\n

But how do you get the long exposures you need, especially on a bright sunny day.<\/p>\n

Getting Long Exposures<\/h5>\n

There are several techniques you can use to get the long exposures you\u2019re looking for.\u00a0 Probably the first thing to do is avoid photographing moving water in direct sunlight. You have two things going against you.\u00a0 The first is the high contrast with specular highlights that will end up as pure white blobs in your image.\u00a0 Not nice.\u00a0 The second is the short exposure times that come with bright scenes, making it hard to blur the water.<\/p>\n

So the first step is to photograph moving water in open shade or, even better, on an overcast day.<\/p>\n

Next, you want to use the lowest ISO setting your camera has.\u00a0 This decreases the sensitivity of your camera\u2019s sensor meaning you need to let more light into your camera to get a correct exposure.<\/p>\n

Third, you want to stop your lens all the way down to f\/16, f\/22 or more if it will go that far.\u00a0 And you\u2019ll be be locking in the f\/stop by shooting aperture priority.<\/p>\n

All of these steps (open shade or overcast sky, low ISO and high f\/stop) have the effect of increasing exposure time.<\/p>\n

But what if this is not enough?\u00a0 What if you do all these things and your exposure time still isn\u2019t long enough?\u00a0 The next thing to try is adding filters.\u00a0 A polarizing filter can decrease your exposure another stop or two while removing some of the reflections from the water.\u00a0 Often this will get your exposure time up to where you\u2019re getting the amount of blur you\u2019re looking for.<\/p>\n

\"varixstack\"<\/a> But if you\u2019re still coming up short there\u2019s another filter \u2013 the variable neutral density filter (not to be confused with the graduated neutral density filter).\u00a0 This filter allows you to dial in anywhere from two to eight stops of neutral density filtration.<\/p>\n

So let\u2019s say that you\u2019ve used these techniques to get your maximum exposure time up to, say, 4 seconds.\u00a0 But is that enough; is it too much?\u00a0 What exposure length will give you the blur effect you\u2019re looking forward?<\/p>\n

Getting the Exposure Length You Want<\/h5>\n

Here\u2019s a trick that Jack Graham<\/a> shared with me and it works really well.\u00a0 It\u2019s an easy way to vary your shutter speed\u00a0 to get the degree of blurring that looks best.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s say you start with ISO 100, F\/22 and a variable neutral density filter set to give you a 4 second exposure.\u00a0 Compose your shot and take it<\/p>\n

Next, without changing the f\/stop double your ISO.\u00a0 This will give you a 2 second exposure at ISO 200.\u00a0 Take the shot.\u00a0 Repeat this, doubling the ISO each time which will halve your shutter speed.\u00a0 So you get 1 second at ISO 400, 1\/2 second at ISO 800, 1\/4 second at ISO 1600, 1\/8 sec at ISO 3200, etc.<\/p>\n

I can hear you now asking \u2018What about noise at the high ISOs?\u201d\u00a0 The current crop of digital SLRs have incredible low noise properties at high ISOs.\u00a0 And to add to that they have built in high ISO noise reduction settings that you will find in your camera\u2019s menu.\u00a0 Consult your camera\u2019s manual to find out how to turn it on.<\/p>\n

Each of these exposures will produce a totally different effect with the water.\u00a0 Now you can select the exposure that gives you the water texture that you like the most.\u00a0 This technique works very well and I encourage you to give it a try.<\/p>\n

The other lesson here is if you like to photograph moving water and don\u2019t have a variable neutral density filter,, consider investing in one.<\/p>\n

Examples<\/h5>\n

Let\u2019s see how this actually works.\u00a0 The following images were captured at Whitney Portal in the Eastern Sierra Nevada mountains of California during a recent photography workshop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
The starting exposure is 2.0 sec at f\/22 and ISO 100. Some of the water shows nice texture but most of it is really smoothed out, resulting in a very soft, misty look.<\/td>\n\"moving_water-1\"<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
In the second image the ISO was increased to 200 which resulted in a 1.6 sec exposure at f\/22.\u00a0 There\u2019s a little bit of definition starting to show up in some of the areas.<\/td>\n\"moving_water-2\"<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Next, I increased the ISO to 400 which dropped the exposure to 0.6 second.\u00a0 There\u2019s even more texture and definition in the water now.\u00a0 More lines are showing up and the image is becoming more dynamic.<\/td>\n\"moving_water-3\"<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
At 800 ISO the shutter speed drops to 1\/3 second which gives the water a lot of definition.\u00a0 The blurring effect is greatly reduced.<\/td>\n\"moving_water-4\"<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
At 1600 ISO the shutter speed is now 1\/6 second.\u00a0 Now the blurring is minimal and water shows discrete lines.<\/td>\n\"moving_water-5\"<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
At 3200 ISO the shutter speed is now reduced to 1\/13 second.\u00a0 This produces the maximum amount of texture and lines.\u00a0 The soft delicate feeling of the first image is completely replaced by a dramatic look.\u00a0 The force and power of the water is much more evident in this image.\u00a0 While this isn\u2019t the \u2018ice sculpture\u2019 look yet, it looks very chiseled.<\/td>\n\"moving_water-6\"<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

The advantage of this technique is that it gives you a choice.You can choose the misty, delicate look of the 2.0 second exposure, the powerful, chiseled look of the 1\/13 second exposure or any of the steps in between.\u00a0 And by applying this technique in the field you have the luxury of making this key decision back in your digital darkroom where you can closely examine the image on your computer\u2019s monitor.<\/p>\n

So, add this technique to your creative vocabulary.\u00a0 You\u2019ll get the look that exactly expresses your interpretation of these beautiful natural wonders.<\/p>\n

Join me on an upcoming workshop.<\/a><\/p>\n

To see more of my photographs click here.<\/a><\/p>\n

(3047)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Landscape photographers love to photograph moving water \u2013 waterfalls, rapids, even water quietly slipping over a rock. When photographing moving water the primary exposure consideration is shutter speed.\u00a0 A very short shutter speed, say 1\/500 sec, can produce the \u2018ice sculpture\u2019 look\u2019 in which the water is suspended in shiny, crystal clear forms.\u00a0 This can … Continue reading “Photography Tutorial – Moving Water”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[13,10,282,93],"class_list":["post-1272","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","category-how-to-articles","tag-photography","tag-ralph-nordstrom","tag-tips-and-techniques","tag-workshop"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9Nl7-kw","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1272","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1272"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1272\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4595,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1272\/revisions\/4595"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1272"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1272"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ralphnordstromphotography.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1272"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}