​Shoot beautiful seascape

Slow door shooting will produce special effects, canvas prints photography enthusiasts often use to record the dynamic main body, such as the rolling traffic flow, the night sky, etc., so you can see the final image is the road traffic flow into a gorgeous spot, the night sky left a beautiful track of star movement.

Slow shot when applied to take the sea, canvas prints online and there will be a different taste, a perennial waves under the effect of slow or unreal dream such as sea of clouds, fog or curing for continuous strips, if taken in slow door, the sky and on the cloud, more overcame the trajectory of the leaves, and these effects cannot be directly see with the naked eye, so can let the viewer to produce such as singular, shock, peaceful and beautiful... And so on feeling will make some flat scenes look much more interesting.

What do you need to do before shooting?

The most important thing to do before shooting is to check out locations, unless you've been to a location many times before. Because the slow door is more focused on the dawn and dusk, that is to say, at dawn, is the dark past, at dusk, custom photo aluminum print is the dark back, if you do not step on the point in advance, it is difficult to find the midnight past shooting point.

Preparation of photographic equipment will be described in detail below, first to introduce some other preparation, because most is black, both ends so flashlight and head lamp is indispensable, before you go to check the battery case, generally take the sea more concentrated in the summer, because summer appears the probability is very big, the blue sky white clouds or typhoon easy to slice, so pay attention to prevent bask in, noon taken attention should be paid to prevent mosquito bites in the morning and evening, before going out remember wearing long-sleeved pants (suggest choose quick dry fabrics) or remember bring mosquito repellent. Sometimes you need to walk on the rocks or stand in the sea to shoot, a pair of non-slip river shoes is the best choice.

Equipment:

Cameras are first recommended for full-frame digital cameras, which have higher pixels, greater width and a familiar perspective from the film era. The lens must be equipped with an ultra-wide lens with a focal length between 16 and 35mm. Several major camera brands on the market have ultra-wide Angle zoom lenses with this focal length.

Full set of slow door sea shooting equipment and accessories

As for the filter system, it is generally composed of transfer and change, bracket and filter, and the filter is divided into GND (medium grey gradient lens) and ND (medium grey gradient lens, also known as dimming lens), GND market is sold and divided into soft gradient, hard gradient, reverse gradient. Soft and hard gradients are commonly used at 0.6, 0.9 and 1.2 levels. The effect of lens grey partial occlusion is equivalent to light reduction at 2, 3 and 4 levels. From the perspective of use, 0.9 level has the highest frequency of use. Reverse gradient is a special lens, the darkest part of the gray lens in the black and white interface, gray from the middle to the edge of the gradual decline, this filter in the slow door in the sea, the sun is the best use at sunrise and sunset near the sea level.

Working photos of all parts used together

The foot frame system includes the foot frame, the cradle head, the fast mounting plate, the cradle head and the fast mounting plate only require the use of convenience, and because of the foot frame in the seaside, sometimes will put the foot frame in the sea, so in order to prevent seawater corrosion, try not to use the metal foot frame, had better use carbon fiber foot frame, that is light and stable, of course the price is also expensive.

When is the best time to shoot? Or does it look different at different times?

As for what time period to shoot, in terms of the year, summer is the most important. In the northern hemisphere in the summer, the subtropical high after the control of the airflow, blowing out the southeast trade wind, commonly known as the ocean monsoon, the blue sky and white clouds will be more and more days, the air is clear, clouds like beautiful, these are an important factor.

From the day, it must be the sunrise and sunset, these two periods of the day is the light and shade of the biggest change, color change, color temperature of the biggest changes in the charming period.

There is another kind of situation, in the summer typhoon day beat the door, is both a challenge and a kind of enjoyment, the challenge is that the photographer or equipment may be wet or wet by the rain or waves, or equipment may not pay attention to be blown down by the typhoon.

Enjoy the filming, cool temperatures, no mosquito bites, the most important thing is that you see at ordinary times can't see the other side of the sea, dark clouds coping, rough, under the slow shooting, means that the clouds of the sky like a momentum pressure, the reefs in the sea surrounded by the cloud of more higher, or the waves is described as more momentum.

How to choose the scene?

A photo this problem very well, there are many factors of success, just slow door on the sea, it must be the choice of scenarios, the sea has particularity, is all the same, where the sea of vision is the level of the sea, so the outlook is very important, has a good foreground picture is half the battle, combined with the weather and cloud like to cooperate, it must be a wonderful film.

In the foreground, you can choose rocks, pebbles, dead branches, fishing boats on the beach, in terms of choosing the foreground, we also have to take into account the particularity of the sea, which is the tides, some of the low tide looks good in the foreground, in the high tide is submerged, some of the high tide looks good in the foreground, in the low tide becomes tasteless.

What effect does the light have on the work?

Since photography is called the art of light and shadow, light is too important for the work, and the change of light will cause different tones, such as the change of color temperature caused by the change of light before and after sunrise or sunset, will produce yellow or blue tones.

Shoot against the light and balance the light ratio of each part of the picture by using a medium gray gradient mirror or shaking a black card

When shooting, the clouds just to the west are more beautiful, can have the smooth shot.

As for the direction of light irradiation, backlight is the main feature in slow door shooting. Photography lovers all know that backlight shooting is the biggest problem that they face, namely, light ratio. It is also because of backlight shooting that they use so many auxiliary means such as filters and black CARDS to ensure the success rate of photos.

At sunrise or sunset, the south side has a better color and can be photographed against the side

The sun's rays at sunrise or sunset are usually red on the opposite side of the west or east side.

There is also a side light, sunrise or sunset, the south or north of the beautiful sunrise or sunset is also a lot of use.

Aperture and shutter control in shooting

Slow door sea recommend M file, so that we can give attention to both the choice of the aperture and shutter, aperture considering the outlook and vision should be within the scope of the depth of field, so choose a small aperture, the scope of the general in F11 - f-18s shutter choice, to see what his intention to effect, from the sea for many years of experience, the shutter fixed in 1/15 of a second - 1 second, waves show filiform, more than ten seconds, the waves are flocculent silk (cotton), more than 30 seconds can be completely atomization.

Exposure techniques

Here the emphasis is on the exposure technique under the slow door shooting, which can also be understood as the exposure under the weak light, one is the exposure time, the second is the exposure technique. The main time of slow door shooting is in the morning and dusk, and there are two periods in this time when the exposure photos are easy to shine, one is 20 minutes before the sun rises, and one is 20 minutes after the sun sets.

Second, exposure technique, two parts, the horizon between the light than the still huge, this kind of circumstance, can through the GND (gradient grey filter) help to narrow the scenario than light, but sometimes a GND still cannot meet the requirements, two pieces of GND partial color easily, which USES RAW records, sometimes late rectifying still time-consuming, laborious the use of this kind of circumstance can try black card, black card should be slow door photograph is important in photography. The black card is actually a piece of black non-reflective paper or plastic sheet, shaking the black card is used to block the scene in the exposure process is too bright parts, in order not to make the black card shielding left traces, in the exposure process to gently shake, so also known as shaking the black card.

Pay attention to composition

Composition is generally based on the traditional photographic composition principle, that is, the rule of three points, taking the sea level as a reference, pay special attention to the level, shooting human portrait can be tilted, because people see the sea habits, tilted sea level will interfere with the balance of the cerebellum, making people very uncomfortable. As to the sea level is put in 1/3 place, or 2/3 place, see specific circumstance and decide, if the sky cloud elephant is beautiful, might as well the sky takes up 2/3, if highlight the foreground, might as well the foreground takes up 2/3, the sea is very calm, there is perfect sunset or sunset reflection, might as well break the routine, five minute composition.

What are the roles of medium grey gradient lens, light reducing lens and CPL polarization lens in shooting?

From left to right: 0.6 soft gradient, 0.9 soft gradient, and reverse gradient

ND mirror is commonly used to have ND8, ND16, ND32, corresponding to the reduction of light 3, 4, 5, now on the market can be adjusted lens, through the rotation of the lens can get different levels of effect, easy to use, but also part of the camera after the use of reflection, lens grey is not uniform, exposure will cause the picture has light and dark block.

From left to right are ND8, ND16, and ND32

CPL also known as linear polarizer, I believe many color friends are familiar with this filter.

CPL (linear polarizer)

Medium grey gradient mirror, light reducing mirror and CPL polarizer are indispensable in slow door shooting and can also be said to be the secret weapon in landscape photography. Sunrise and sunset is a good time to take pictures of low light, but in this case the sky and the ground light ratio are still larger, if the sky exposure is accurate, the ground will be underexposed and become completely dark; if the ground exposure is correct, the sky will be overexposed and become a dead white. Although synthetic exposure can be used to surround or HDR can be used to solve part of the situation, but not good grasp of the post-processing of HDR, the picture will sometimes appear more false, unnatural. The surrounding composite exposure will also bring a lot of work to the later stage, if the later software processing is not skilled, it is extremely troublesome. So try to do a good job in the early shooting, do not rely on the late, I always think the early is a dish, the late is seasoning, cannot put the cart before the horse. Medium grey gradient mirror is a piece of filter from top to bottom, from black to grey to colorless transparent gradually transition, there are circular, square plug style.

It is recommended to use a medium grey gradient filter in the style of square inserts so that the composition can be adjusted flexibly. The upper portion of the filter according to different degree of dark, also can be divided into different levels, can try to use different according to the scene of the light gray gradient lens, but it is not recommended superposition is used, it has already been said the partial color problem, if a couple of overlay will reduce image quality, so it's best to cooperate with the black card use, reduce local into the light, finally get the whole picture exposure balanced work.

The following is the light reducing mirror, the light reducing mirror is also divided into square plug type and circular screw type, according to the use of experience, it is recommended to use circular screw type to the lens, because the square plug type in the long exposure more or less leakage phenomenon. Use lens, the reduction is according to the site can't satisfy the shooting effect of slow light, reduce were also a few points, according to the experience of use, using five minus lens, namely ND32, a view from the window to see out, is already a dark, causing inconvenience to the composition, this situation can only liking first, screw on minus lens again, so use these filters when shooting also need enough patience.

Again, CPL, or linear polarization mirror, this is a special lens, some photographers almost rotate in the lens as a UV mirror to use, and it is also a lens, about the same as ND4, that is, two levels of light. CPL is not only used to eliminate the reflection on the surface of the object, but also to make the subject object more saturated in color. When the slow door beats the sea or water, it can eliminate the reflection on the water surface and present the rocks or creatures under the water with a special effect.

Finally, it is suggested that not all the filters are good, more than one filter, the image quality will decline some, the color is more biased some, so the filter can meet the basic requirements, less energy is less.

What else do I need to pay attention to when shooting seascape with a slow door?

In addition to some of the above, I also need to add that, because of the unpredictable size of waves when shooting at the beach, the camera and lens will be wet from time to time, so it is best to use a waterproof cover, if not, use plastic bags or plastic wrap to wrap the camera and lens.

Sometimes the waves are larger, canvas floating frame forming water mist in the air, after a while, lens or filter will be covered with a layer of mist, so it is recommended to carry absorbent paper or lens cloth. Return to the place where there is fresh water after shooting, and develop the tripod. If the camera and lens are also bare and not wet by the spray, it is also recommended to wipe with a fresh water soaked towel.