The Lake Wildwood fountain 3 (as is)
I’ve driven past this fountain for over 7 years and twice before attempted to take photographs of it – once during the day and once at night. The daytime shots were OK and basically showed the fountain in its setting: a large and pretty golf course. I tried to isolate the fountain but its location pretty much prevented that. The nighttime shots were a bit different and hid the greens and fairways of the golf course well while actuating the fountain. Unfortunately, I wasn’t anywhere near up to the challenge of capturing the shot until last week.
The difference this time was the combined usage of NO ISO boosting, proper aperture, and much slower shutter speeds. I pulled up the shutter time to a full 29.1 seconds by using the “BULB” setting instead of a preset shutter speed. The D80 will make a 30 second open shutter but I tried it for about 30 minutes and was never satisfied until I found the “sweet spot” at a touch over 29 seconds manually.
To offset that much light coming into my Nikkor 18-35 kit lens, I set the exposure bias (what I always call the ‘offset’) to -5 and the camera automatically upped that to -6, tho I don’t know why or how. LOL! Finally, the aperture was set at f/36, much smaller than I’d ever tried before. But the slower shutter speed mandated constant light for a long time so I shrunk the lens opening quite the opposite as I would have with shooting the moon or nighttime buildings.
It took a bit over 1 hour for me to eventually get the settings the way I wanted them, lock the tripod down as securely as possible, and use the remote trigger to trip the shutter release. (Using my hand, no matter how carefully, caused shake that blurred the image enough to see.)
One other important thing of note: my focal length was 42 mm because I used the kit lens, the wide angle Nikkor that came with the camera. This made the fountain a LOT smaller in the finished shot instead of filling the frame as I used to do using a telephoto lens. The difference there was the PhotoShop Elements program I used to make the shot large enough for Red Bubble but do absolutely nothing else. I had been trying to get the largest shot out of the camera and enlarge less in post-shoot processing. I now know that putting a smaller but better image into the software is far preferable to putting in a large image that sucks anyway. LOL!
I hope some of this makes sense to the budding photographers new to DSLR shooting. And as usual, I give enormous credit to the work and comments of oastudios, a master of getting the balance between water and light perfectly. SEE HIS STUFF!
The Lake Wildwood fountain 3 (as is) belongs to the following groups:
Fountains, Wrought Iron & Gates etc. - New Years edition and Western United States Artists and Photographers Available for sale asGreeting Cards, Matted Prints, Laminated Prints, Mounted Prints, Canvas Prints, Framed Prints and Posters
midzing
brilliant shot,,, and thank you for the information,,,, well done
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied
Thank you and you’re welcome!
Karirose
Very nice. :)
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied
Thank you! :-D
handprintz
Goregeous light and lovely soft capture ! love it !! xo
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied
Thanks Trudi! Another shot I really wanted to get to share. :-)
sweetscent62
It’s a lovely fountain LL : ) and a great image! Magical and serene…. Wen xox
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied
Thank you, Wendy! It came out looking that way after making the shot as soft as possible. ;-)
stephaniek
Great photo! Always nice when you know how the camera works! LOL.
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied
LOL! I don’t know the half of it about the Nikon D80 but I’m closing in on how to get most of what I want. Thanks for the compliment!
Glen Allen
excellent lots of work paying off.
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied
Thank you very much, Glen! I’ll know I’ve slipped past “experienced hobbiest” into “inexperienced professional” when I can do this sort of shot without 60 minutes of messing with a camera I should know better in 30 months. LOL!
solareclips~Ju...
Beautiful misty shot Lenny!!! Thank you for the lesson!! ;-)
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied
Thank you very much, babe! I don’t know if anyone is actually learning from my dumping details under shots but I’m hoping it makes simple things easier for beginners. I’m certainly no DSLR teacher but I can show what I do and how I do it.
If you have a Ritz Camera Store (or any of their other names) nearby you can get some of the free lessons I get from a REAL professional teacher. Those classes pushed me ahead of my learning curve every single week I went.
totty23
looks very pritty i love how it stands out on its own :o)
sam
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied
Thanks! Since it was the only light source I was going to allow into the lens, it pretty much HAD to stand out or turn black like the background. LOL! I had a LOT of shots that were black as tar before I started working out the details. :-)
Jonathan Dower
great shot and an amazing description! I love it!
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied
Well, thank you very much, Jonathan! I worked almost as hard on the recording of the details as the nailing of the shot because I took this with the plan to tell how I did it. When I come to one of those shots that just pushes me to the limits, documenting the journey only seems fair to share. Just keep in mind that I’m no pro! I’m pretty much like most people here: a lover of the photographic arts. I’ll be a PROFESSIONAL lover of the photographic arts when I make that first $100 for Red Bubble to send to me. LMFAO!!!!
Jonathan Dower
I wish you luck in getting that first $100. I’m a way off- 7 months I have been on redbubble sold an astonishing… 0 works!!! lol. I’m no pro either!
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied
LOL! I’ve got an ace in the hole coming up and we ALL have Christmas to shoot for. My company is having an all-day craft’s fair where I plan to have a hundred post cards, at least 3 or four mounted shots, and (hopefully) a couple of those STELLAR matted and framed prints for show and sale. (I’ll tag everything as “For display only until final hour of fair. Put in your reservations for purchase display items anytime but supplies are limited to what you see unless you purchase on Red Bubble”)
I’m pretty sure I can get some mounted prints sold for much more than the creation prices because I’ll do “cheapos” for display and show the higher class and quality prints for showing off how good Red Bubble’s work will be if they order there.
I’ve sold a few cards (to people other than myself, I mean. LOL) and I’ve gotten nibbles for mounts so I think it will break open for me fairly soon. The key is to put out as much quality work as possible, let as many people see it as possible (It’s on my personal business cards and I put a piece in a public cafeteria for display.), and pray. You’ll have a sale before you know it. :-) You’ve REALLY got the “show and tell” idea down with the amount of groups you belong to. :-D
Alan Findlater
excellent work well done
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied
Thank you! I appreciate that!
budrfli
your time and expertise paid off! wonderful take, love the softness with the background!
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied
I thank you, budrfli! This one is going into the books as “the one I caught that DIDN’T get away”! ;-)
LindaR
wonderful Lenny ~ so glad you were able to capture this ~ xx
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied
Thank you, Linda!
Jan Piller
ahhh – here it is… very beautiful!
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied
You found it! And I found your kind comment – a month later! I am sooooooooooo bad but thank you belatedly!
Anthony Hedger
beautiful soft shot Lenny
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied
Thanks! It was my first with the super-soft flowing water that I am now seriously hooked on. I was able to get it flowing smoothly before but never soft and smooth.
DeviousLili
Please consider adding this image (and other fountain-type pretties) to Fountains
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied
Thanks for the invite and, in my best Rod Sterling voice, “Submitted for your approval…” :-D
kahli-boo 21 days ago
great shot Lenny la rue
Lenny La Rue, IPA replied 20 days ago
Thank you very much, kahli-boo! Our names rhyme. :-D