settings for sunset shots!

Hilal · Nov 25, 1999

Please advise me on c950 settings for sunset shots.--Hilal

ian · Nov 26, 1999

Hilal said:
Please advise me on c950 settings for sunset shots.

Three things.
1. Letting in less light will give you richer colors.
2. Spot metering (actually related to #1)
3. Whitebalance, whitebalance, whitebalance.

Even pointed directly at the sun during a sunset, the camera tends to
see all that dark sky to the sides, and will open up the aperature
or slow the shutter speed to let in more light. It's subtle but
this will completely wash out the colors of a sunset. Some of
the best sunsets I've gotten were taken when I had accidentally
left the camera in shutter speed priority, set at some high
speed like 1/250th. You might try that, or simply use the EV adjustment
and bump it down a few notches.

Next, try spot metering. This will keep the camera concentrated
on the brightest part of the sky, if not the sun itself, and you'll
get a better color balance for the stuff in the center of the shot.

Last, manual white balance.
Typical scenario: It's twilight and there's a deep rich blue sky
over your head and a fantastic sunset to the west. You whip out the
camera and snap a shot of the red/yellow clouds in front/above
the sun and the end result is a shot showing a bunch of white clouds
in front of a nearly white sun. Oops. The camera's auto white balance
did a nice job of adjusting for all that annoying red and yellow.
This is what I do to fix that.
I look around me for something that's gray or white. A white building
or even a gray sidewalk generally works for me. Take a manual whitebalance
reading off that, and then take your shot. It'll do wonders for
the colors in your sunsets. Deep rich reds, yellows.. greens.. whatever's out
there. It doesn't even mess up the blues.

The end result of all these tweaks may not be perfect, but it'll leave
you a lot closer to where you want to be and require only a little adjustment
in Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro to fix right up.

Last hack. If you've taken a sunset shot that already came out too
bright, try your Gamma adjustment in PS or PSP and cut it WAY back, like
0.50 or something. Sometimes there's still enough information in
the photo that this will bring some life back to the colors. The
highlight midtone shadows tool can do it too, but I like Gamma better
for this specific problem.

Here's a few of my sunset/twilight shots:
http://albums.photopoint.com/j/AlbumIndex?u=63520&a=513773
The first and last two shots were from when I discovered the power
of the whitebalance. And those are not artificialy red at all.
That is almost exactly what I saw in the sky at the time.

This one is also fairly amusing.
members.home.com/frechett/mont99/mont99-sunset4.jpg
That is flying geese in front of a sunset, taken at 1/250th from my
car window while driving at 60mph across Wyoming. How's that
for an action shot?

Member said:
Hilal

ian

Mark Fink · Nov 29, 1999

Regarding white balance, I've found that setting it to daylight yields great colors that closely match what I actually saw.

ian said:
Hilal said:

Please advise me on c950 settings for sunset shots.

Click to expand...

Three things.
1. Letting in less light will give you richer colors.
2. Spot metering (actually related to #1)
3. Whitebalance, whitebalance, whitebalance.

Even pointed directly at the sun during a sunset, the camera tends to
see all that dark sky to the sides, and will open up the aperature
or slow the shutter speed to let in more light. It's subtle but
this will completely wash out the colors of a sunset. Some of
the best sunsets I've gotten were taken when I had accidentally
left the camera in shutter speed priority, set at some high
speed like 1/250th. You might try that, or simply use the EV adjustment
and bump it down a few notches.

Next, try spot metering. This will keep the camera concentrated
on the brightest part of the sky, if not the sun itself, and you'll
get a better color balance for the stuff in the center of the shot.

Last, manual white balance.
Typical scenario: It's twilight and there's a deep rich blue sky
over your head and a fantastic sunset to the west. You whip out the
camera and snap a shot of the red/yellow clouds in front/above
the sun and the end result is a shot showing a bunch of white clouds
in front of a nearly white sun. Oops. The camera's auto white balance
did a nice job of adjusting for all that annoying red and yellow.
This is what I do to fix that.
I look around me for something that's gray or white. A white building
or even a gray sidewalk generally works for me. Take a manual whitebalance
reading off that, and then take your shot. It'll do wonders for
the colors in your sunsets. Deep rich reds, yellows.. greens..
whatever's out
there. It doesn't even mess up the blues.

The end result of all these tweaks may not be perfect, but it'll leave
you a lot closer to where you want to be and require only a little
adjustment
in Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro to fix right up.

Last hack. If you've taken a sunset shot that already came out too
bright, try your Gamma adjustment in PS or PSP and cut it WAY back, like
0.50 or something. Sometimes there's still enough information in
the photo that this will bring some life back to the colors. The
highlight midtone shadows tool can do it too, but I like Gamma better
for this specific problem.

Here's a few of my sunset/twilight shots:
http://albums.photopoint.com/j/AlbumIndex?u=63520&a=513773
The first and last two shots were from when I discovered the power
of the whitebalance. And those are not artificialy red at all.
That is almost exactly what I saw in the sky at the time.

This one is also fairly amusing.
members.home.com/frechett/mont99/mont99-sunset4.jpg
That is flying geese in front of a sunset, taken at 1/250th from my
car window while driving at 60mph across Wyoming. How's that
for an action shot?

Member said:

Hilal

Click to expand...

ian

Peter iNova · Nov 29, 1999

Mark Fink said:
Regarding white balance, I've found that setting it to daylight yields
great colors that closely match what I actually saw.

Good advice. A white balance done to the golden rays of a low sun, even though off of a white building will be a gold balance. Another minor pair of tweaks can come from shooting with Cloudy or Flash white balance for slightly warmer tones.

This one was underexposed (as far as the matrix meter was concerned) by -0.7 EV and shot with Cloudy white balance:

-iNova

Bob Pitz · Nov 30, 1999

Sorry, I clicked the wrong button. I meant to respond to these posts. Look at the Sunsets post this date.
bobpitz

Peter iNova said:
Mark Fink said:

Regarding white balance, I've found that setting it to daylight yields
great colors that closely match what I actually saw.

Click to expand...

Good advice. A white balance done to the golden rays of a low sun, even
though off of a white building will be a gold balance. Another minor
pair of tweaks can come from shooting with Cloudy or Flash white balance
for slightly warmer tones.

This one was underexposed (as far as the matrix meter was concerned) by
-0.7 EV and shot with Cloudy white balance:

-iNova

Bob Pitz · Nov 30, 1999

Love the shot, Peter.

Peter iNova said:
Mark Fink said:

Regarding white balance, I've found that setting it to daylight yields
great colors that closely match what I actually saw.

Click to expand...

Good advice. A white balance done to the golden rays of a low sun, even
though off of a white building will be a gold balance. Another minor
pair of tweaks can come from shooting with Cloudy or Flash white balance
for slightly warmer tones.

This one was underexposed (as far as the matrix meter was concerned) by
-0.7 EV and shot with Cloudy white balance:

-iNova

ian · Nov 30, 1999

Peter iNova said:
Mark Fink said:

Regarding white balance, I've found that setting it to daylight yields
great colors that closely match what I actually saw.

Click to expand...

Good advice. A white balance done to the golden rays of a low sun, even
though off of a white building will be a gold balance.

I forgot to mention, that I white balance off things between me
and the sun, and not on things cast in a gold light.

Nice pic BTW.

ian

Search

settings for sunset shots!

Hilal

Guest

ian

Guest

Mark Fink

Member

Peter iNova

Guest

Bob Pitz

Guest

Bob Pitz

Guest

ian

Guest

Keyboard shortcuts