Mt. Rundle

All comments welcome.

Ian, that's amazing light with a view to match. Did you do this with a grad or blending?

Excellent shot . it composed well by beauty colors.but its frame is not good as other ...Best Regards HSP

Very nice landscape. You really captured the moment. -Jim

Fantastic work. Are you using a split ND filter for your landscapes?

Thanks everyone for the comments!

 

Hamed, I agree with you entirely. The frame is awkward at best for my few panoramas. But, I figured consistency across my portfolio was better than dropping the frame. Having everything in white, square frames really unifies the portfolio page.

 

Jeff and Kevin, I'd be happy to give some specifics.

 

1. I had trouble finding ANYTHING for a foreground and I was late to the scene and didn't have time to hunt for something. But, I wasn't thinking about panoramas at the time. So, this is -- unfortunately -- a tight crop from a single frame (rather than a stitch)

 

2. This is shot with a grad filter. Probably either my 3-stop hard or 3-stop reverse held at the edge of the lake.

 

I just don't do blends well. Or, more to the point, to do them well, it takes MUCH longer at the computer than I would like to give. I like to spend no more than 30 minutes in RAW conversion and (at most) another 20 minutes in PS and a seemlessly done blend takes me longer than that.

 

3. Kevin, yes, I use grads for most of my work (even my urban and/or night-time work).

 

I regularly use a 2-stop soft and 3-stop hard. I also use a 3-stop reverse MUCH more than I ever thought I would.

 

I also have a few others either lying around or on my wish list. I am in the midst of switching from Cokin P-size filters to Cokin Z-Pro size (i.e. Lee size, 4"x6"). So, I hope to end up with a 3-stop soft and 2-stop hard in 4x6 and maybe (they are very costly) a 4-stop hard.

 

I switched to 4x6 filters because I hand-hold the filter most of the time (you can then move it a little and help blur the line -- plus, it is quicker).

Thanks Ian. Hand holding a grad seems like hard work to me but I guess that it's what you are comfortable with. What do you use the reverse grad for?

The detail in the shadows of this image and your Mt Kerkeslin shot is very well done and suggests some sort of grad filter. I guess I will have to look into them if I plan on doing any serious landscape work.

Jeff, hand-holding the grad is what I find easier, actually. I find the holders -- even the Lee ones which are much better than the Cokins ever were -- to be finicky. If you want to adjust the filter just a tiny 1mm amount, it is hard to get it right where you want it without fiddling several times. If I just slap the filter over the lens without the holder I can get it precisely aligned more quickly.

Also, with the Cokin system, the filter holder was fairly large and time consuming to take on and off. So, you either had to have one for every lens (which was obnoxious due to the bulkiness), or you didn't have enough time to put it on sometimes. The Lee system is better. It allows you to put a ring on every lens and then simply snap the actual holder over the ring -- modular, fast and effective.

I am always on a tripod, so hand-holding the grad is really quite easy. The only exceptions are if you have a 15-30 second exposure, your arm can get tired holding the filter!

Also, I do sometimes end up hand-holding a hand-held shot and those are tricky; but, I have learned how to do it.

--

As for the reverse grad, it is useful for bright horizons with darker upper skies. I have a number of shots where preserving the detail in the darker upper sky and the intensely bright horizon at the same time would have been very difficult without the reverse grad.

In this: http://photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=7770721. Either the distant hills ont he horizon line would have completely burnt out or the top bit of the sky would have fallen to totally back. I might have been able to save them in post processing; but, the reverse grad made my life easier.

Here: http://photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=7871497. You can see the classic use for a reverse grad. In fact, if I owned a neutral density strip filter (http://www.singh-ray.com/morefilt.html -- second item on the page) I would have used one here instead. I had to bring the grey cloud mass back up in post anyways.

And, here is another: http://photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=8668103. I think I'd have lost the upper corners to blackness if I hadn't had a reverse grad -- they were almost black before I worked on the image as it was.

That last one was also shot hand-held (I had pulled over beside the road and didn't have time to set up my tripod). I needed a fast shutter (used ISO 800) to stop the very fast wind blown motion in the grass anyways; so, a tripod was not needed for stability. So, I hand held the camera and hand-held the grad.

Kevin, there are some photographers who never use grads anymore and only blend and they get great (and natural looking) results. This has the advantage of meaning they never have to worry about scratched filters, streaky filters, rain-spotted filters, or dirty filters. Nor do they have worry about vignetting from the filters and they can slap on a lens hood to cut down flare too. Plus, they avoid the expense and the hassle. If you have great PS skills, or want to develop them I encourage trying blending by hand -- even if I have had difficulty getting as consistent a result with blending alone.

Thom Hogan (independent Nikon lens reviewer, landscape photographer) and has written that he no longer uses grads. http://www.bythom.com/index.htm

Chip Phillips does a lot of blending very well (http://photo.net/photodb/member-photos?user_id=3838934). He recently picked up some grads and has been using them; but, he started on only blending.

Marc Adamus says he starts with grads and then also takes bracketed shots and blends small portions for detail retention. This is probably the path that makes the most sense to me and which I hope to develop the skills to follow. http://photo.net/photodb/member-photos?user_id=1353935

Ian, many thanks for the explanation and examples. I can't say that I have encountered similar scenes a lot, but now that you have made me aware of them, I am sure that I will start to see them. I thought that I had a good grad collection already.

 

I just checked, and it looks like Lee doesn't make reverse grads. That would explain why I was unaware of them.

 

I'm not a great fan of blending, probably because my PS skills are lacking, and I always prefer to get it right at exposure time. That probably says more about me being an old person than anything else.

It works well as a pano for me. A great view with fabulous light and colour.

 

Simon

Jeff, yeah the only reverse grads available are from the oh-so-expensive Singh-Ray. But, then again, they make great stuff and have great customer service.

 

Thanks, Simon.