K-5 and Waterfalls

Today I was out playing around with my K-5. Took about 50 shots. I took this shot with a ND4 filter. Any suggestions? Thank you!

Ithaca Falls, Ithaca NY USA

All in all a pretty pleasing shot (looking at it on a phone so can't see it in detail). The inclusion of a person at bottom right gives it life but the light strip in top left is a bit distracting.
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http://www.flickr.com/photos/leggeron/
Just so you know how good/bad I am at this.

I shot this at f/22 to get a slow shutter speed. Somebody told me never use apertures smaller than approximately f/11 to avoid diffraction, so I'm a little confused!

Hi David,

People say a lot of things. In the end - I feel - you need to try and see for youself.
The person you spoke to was probably talking about diffraction, which lowers sharpness across the lens frame. Does it matter for the shot you took with your lens and your camera? That's up to you to work out. You probably won't notice it unless you print big.
If you are concerned or it does affect your work you could investigate ND filters.
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Cheers,
N
nigelrobinson.wordpress.com

confused by the comment about the light strip being distracting..?

that comment was likely made with no regard to aperture. with same overall exposure or brightness of the image (so any mix and match of shutter/aperture//ISO you may have used), the rocks in the upper left would be distracting. the rock and the white water are bright and just catch the eye.

i was going to suggest a polarizer, if you have one. it might help with the glare on the pool of water. they also reduce exposure by about 2 stops. so, you would then be at f/11.

if you don't have a polarizer but do have software that allows 'highlight' recovery on an adjustment layer (like LR 4 & 5 as well as others), maybe select the water and try playing with the 'highlight' slider. well, this will only, maybe, work if you used RAW.

as far as f/22...
no, not so good really. i have sometimes used f/13. f/11 is better.
did you shoot JPG or RAW? if you shot JPG, you might be able to take that same shot at f/13 (more light) but then be able to 'recover' the 1-stop overexposure in software...

Perhaps you shot JPG, though... i see ISO was 200
typically, you would want to set that for 80 and then you could have used f/13 with the same result. i guess JPG, though, with highlight recovery on? I think limits minimum ISO to 200..? However, using JPG, highlight recovery was a reasonable choice.

if RAW, ISO 200 isn't a good choice and highlight recovery don't help with RAW images, anyway.

so, for technical recommendations, i might try polarizer (if you have one) or playing with 'highlight' slider on a selection of water only. it is best to use RAW for things like this (if you have software to work with it and care to try) and, with RAW, use ISO 80.

If you don't want RAW, there is a way to use multiple exposure in camera to blend together the separate images and give one final image with whatever exposure you chose. Actually, the camera will blend RAW for you as well..  Anyway, the benefit is that his can help in place of or in addition ND filters... Proper use of ND filter is better, but I used this technique with RAW and it works okay. Here is a thread to get you started, if interested: http://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/2795453#forum-post-35188423

It is about K20 but a comment mentions it works similarly for K7 so should for K5 as well.  I used the technique with K20 but do other things now.  There are other threads about this mufti-exposure technique as well.

Hi,

Nice shot and a nice waterfall!  I tried a 4 stop ND filter and found that it was not enough to use medium apertures like you have found, a 9-10 stop ND filter is really what you need. The good thing about the K5 is you can use live view for focusing by magnifying and after for composing the scene.

I dream of finding a waterfall like this one.

It is a pretty waterfall.
I never thought about using live view after the filter was on..  I focus and etc. then screw the filter on being careful to not jiggle quickshift manual focus.

OP, this type of operation, either my way or David's way, is a good time to have focus operation decoupled from shutter button.  Use the rear AF button to get things set (or liveview) and then take the picture with shutter button.  Unless you move, focus shouldn't need adjustment while you try a few shots.

If I used live view to frame and focus, I might go back to optical viewfinder while I am taking my pictures.  Saves battery.

If you don't like the idea of turning the rear AF button to 'enable AF' and the shutter button AF function to off, you could set up a user mode for.. waterfalls or whatever you like and try out the rear button that way.

Thank you for your comments. I really appreciate your experience. I'm not unhappy with the photo, just wondering if I could do it better! And the confusion I mentioned is about diffraction vs. aperture choices.

I used a ND4 filter. And I thought I was shooting in RAW+JPG file format, but it turned out I overlooked that detail and I was in JPG only. So no RAW. Oh well. Also, I bought Photoshop and LR but still have a long way to go as far as learning how to make the best use of them. It seems I've mostly been keywording my pre-existing photos in LR for months now!

However, on a related note, I just tried selecting all three file format modes, and no ISO lower than 200 can be selected using any of them. So I am unsure how I might select an even lower ISO.

I also tried a few exposures using the HDR AUTO feature, but I am not sure if this is one of them. There also is one shot taken with HDR HIGH mode, but it looks awful to me.

By the way there was this serious, bearded Canon DSLR guy with a tripod there, too. I tried to strike up a conversation, but he wasn't all that eager to share any wisdom.

The main point though to me is I had fun. so much fun that I lost track of the time, and to me that is a good thing. And I really like the K-5!

Here is another shot from this session. On this one I did select the shadow area and tried to brighten it. I think the result looks a little too blue, unnatural.

Thanks,

"Pentax Rookie Dave"

Ithaca Falls, Ithaca, New York USA

Hmm..
K5 should have ISO 80 available.

Try to check that highlight protection isn't on.  I think this will limit you to ISO 200 and it must affect RAW file format (with respect to limiting ISO choice but not any beneficial effect) as well.

For JPG, highlight protection can be a good thing.  For RAW, it isn't really beneficial if you are careful with exposure.  You take care to not clip highlights and work on the file in PP.  You are your own highlight protection.

Thing is, if you do RAW+JPG with highlight protection off, your RAW file will benefit from lower ISO and careful exposure but your JPG will be left out in the cold.  Not always, maybe, but in high contrast scenes like your waterfall, your JPG will suffer for not having highlight protection on.  Not a reason to not try RAW at lower ISO but just a thing to think of.

With ISO 100 available to you, ISO only becomes available if you turn on 'extended ISO range' in custom menu.  The K-5 ISO 80 is actually beneficial.  It is not a camera+ISO trick to simulate exposure settings at ISO 80.  DR is a bit greater in ISO 80 than in ISO 100.  A little  :^)

As David did, I started with a lower power ND.
Mine was a 3-stop rather than his 4-stop.
I now have a 10-stop, myself.  It is more flexible for daylight use.  I don't always like the very smooth look and sometimes like a bit of texture in water.  The 3-4 stop ND can be good for this without stressing small aperture too much or for evening pictures.  3-4 stop very hard to get silk water in sun  :^)

But even a 10-stop wouldn't be too much for your first picture.  Dropping ISO to 80 but also opening aperture a couple stops and then adding several stops longer shutter for the darker filter and you should still be within the 30 second metering limit of your camera.  So no timing exposure on the cell phone.  Really, the 10 stop might be good to further protect the highlights in the upper left and for other scenes in more direct sun.

I first thought 10-stop or close to it might be too dark.
If interested, take some pictures you like and work out equivalent exposures with the 10-stop in the mix.  See if it is darker than you like.  There is a convenience hurdle beyond 30 seconds shutter.  I use cell phone timer for that...

I don't think it looks too blue.  I think both the exposure and WB are a good balance between your day light and shade parts.
It is also 'what it is' unless you do more in software  :^)

Some software allows different white balance settings on the selected area you made to brighten the shadows.  I am sure Lightroom allows this.  Others may as well.

Can I stack and combine ND filters?

Thank you!

Like the photo a lot. Go back in four months+ and you won't need the neutral density filter. But the Zen guy won't be there either.
Bruce

Sure, they can be stacked.

However, I think it is better to have fewer elements/filters in front of your lens.  It isn't wrong to stack but maybe a best practice to not stack.  The more things stacked, the more chance of lower quality..  But if you need them for the shot and they are all you got, I would recommend stacking to enable you to use a moderate aperture before using  f/22 without stacking.  Plus, always the hood helps.