Skills!

 

very clean Z!

 

Awesome Z + Beautiful Sunset = Excellent Pictures.
Very Nice Job.

 

absolutely stunning

 

great choice on both of those flashes, i'll hopefully be picking up some 383's soon

 

For the Canon pics... ISO 200, only because the expanded range that is selectable limits the lowest ISO to 200 on the 40D. ISO 100 for the Olympus. You can just go to my flickr page and select each pic and view the settings for the shots.

Generally, you only want to use the lowest ISO settings to limit noise for any type shot you take, unless shutter speed and aperture are at the maximum/minimum you desire... and you want to speed up the shutter speed either to freeze a shot where a long exposure + tripod would just blur a moving subject, or to handhold a shot to prevent camera shake.

I'll be posting a "how to" for these sunset shots as soon as I get back from work... and why you should be using flash for them.

 

What front lip is that?

 

Very nice shots.
I used to own the same lens, very interesting things you can do with it!

 

Wow. Poster worthy material!

 

Stunning pics. I love them wheels.

 

high quality pics please for my wallpaper!! These are great!!

 

Varis

 

Still gettin' better man! Nice work with all the equipment and setup. Lots of work I imagine went into this shoot, but your pics are awesome! Kinda miss your old Advans, but the TE's are tough to beat. Great looking ride as always. Hawaii, still lovely as I remember. Your pics really capture the 'spirit' man, I know kinda lame, but it's true. You wouldn't even have to tell me that's Hawaii, and I'd guess it haha! Keep up the good work!

Take care

 

Not really all that hard to set up... easy in fact.

I keep getting comments that they liked the Advans, and really, I do miss them, and wish I kept them just to swap them out, cause you get tired of the same look after awhile, you know. But yeah.

The sky wasn't filled with too many nice clouds, and I'll just have to find time to go back and better capture the "essence" of the islands... although that area I was at is actually filled with druggies and dealers. Although I'm not scared being there, I am UNEASY, especially that I'm there by myself. Friends think I'm crazy taking pics of my "kid."

Anyways.....

here's the lowdown on taking a better sunset pic.

You need a flash to light your subject with a sunset used as background.

Since the background (sunset) is a bright, actually, really bright compared to the subject (car) in the foreground, pictures taken that expose (camera settings) for the sunset will leave you with a dark subject. Conversely, expose for the car (change the settings for a brighter exposure), and the sunset will be too bright and undefined, undramatic.

Here's a sample from a past shoot that exposes for the sky (sunset), hence the dark car.


You an play around in photoshop like here:

But brightening the exposure usually brings out the noise.

This is a problem common in photography. That's why usually, the subject in sunset shots are just silhouettes:


I just used techniques used by portrait photographers that expose for the sunset, and just use artificial light to light the person, or in this case, the car.

Setup is simple, you'll need a minimum of 2 strobes (flashes). I've taken to the STROBIST approach that I want everything as portable as possible, hence the hot-shoe strobes. Plus, they're cheap. Place and angle the strobes on the sides where you're shooting from, like the example below.


Cost is about $90 for the strobes... try to find some Sunpak 383 Super or Vivitar 285HV. The Sunpaks are discontinued, but I prefer them to the Vivitar. If you have TTL strobes for your system, great, use them, but don't buy them just to do off-camera lighting. I have a 580EX II and 430EX, but prefer to do the stressful lighting to the cheapos. You'll need the stands ($20 for Impact 6') and wireless triggers to set the flashes off... This is where it becomes expensive. Popular brands include Pocket Wizard, but they are expensive, $200+. I use Elinchrom Skyport Universals, as they are $100 for the transmitter, $100 for each additional receiver. You need a receiver for each flash, or you can just use a Y splitter and share the receiver with each flash, but you will have to deal with a wire, which can get in the shot.

Settings for the camera should be in Manual. Set the shutter to 1/250 (usually the fasted sync speed with the triggers) and aperture to about F13. Take a practice shot of the sunset and adjust the aperture so you get a nice exposure of the sunset. Keep that setting and introduce the flashes. Adjust power on the flashes till you get an exposure that gets you a properly exposed sunset and car. As the sun gets lower light from the sun gets dimmer. When this happens, using the same settings will net you a darker sunset. To adjust for this, keep the same shutter speed, and adjust the aperture larger (smaller numbers) till you get a properly exposed sunset again. Just remember to also adjust the power on the strobes also. Keep checking the shots on the LCD.

If you want to keep a larger Depth of Field (DOF, more distant/close objects in focus), slow the shutter down, but not slow enough not to sync properly with the flashes. Remember, increasing aperture decreases DOF.

There are other modes you can use, like Aperture Priority. You'll want to change the settings to sync at 1/250 when a flash is present on the camera, that way, when you change the aperture in Av mode, the shutter speed stays constant at 1/250. This is actually the best mode to use when doing flash photography, just remember to change the camera settings to sync at 1/250 when a flash is on.

Other accessories you can use are umbrellas that diffuses the light from the strobes better, or attachments like and Omni-Bounce. I prefer to use a bare strobe as umbrellas tend to blow over.

Oh, lastly, for budding photographers, use the lowest ISO settings your camera allows. You only want to use a higher ISO setting when you want to freeze a moving subject, and the light is too low to use a fast enough shutter speed. Or when you want a fast shutter for handheld shots, especially in low-light. Again, mainly, you want a higher ISO to speed up your shutter. Higher ISO means more noise. Although sensors are getting better and better dealing with high ISO noise, usually lower ISO's give you a cleaner image.

 

good write up. now i want to go find a good spot to do sunset photos of my Z using strobes

 

ctwentytwo,

Thanks for the write up, you are very knowledgable and it shows in your shots.

 

Makes for a good desktop wallpaper

 

Those photos look amazing.

 

+1 best photos I've seen on here in awhile

 

I must say, spectacular photography!