Lake Travers Sunrise

[Andrew McLachlan]

155704

Shortly after creating the image in the previous post yesterday the sun began to light up the clouds above Lake Travers, but by this time the clouds were starting to break-up so the clouds were not going to appear as dramatic as I had hoped, but I did like the way the remaining clouds illuminated.

I am thinking the lake water should probably be a little darker than it is as in the previous post.

Nikon D800
Nikon 18-35mm @ 19mm
ISO 100
f16 @ 1.3 seconds
Singh Ray 3-stop Reverse Grad Filter

Look forward to comments.

[Don Railton]

A very nice image Andrew... Love the sky, well, the whole scene really. I do think a little darker water would help a little with seperation from the sky, but its less noticeable to me than in the last image. I see a magenta haze over the trees RHS which look like indifferent masking but, its also in the reflection on the water so I think now its just fog.. The whispy gold cloud over the water is wonderful.

DON

[Don Lacy]

Very subtle colors and hues here AndrewI think they work well along with the fog and water giving a nice peaceful feel to the image. Again I think you could have tone down the reflection just a tad more.

[Diane Miller]

Simply gorgeous!! I agree on the reflection -- just a bit darker.

If it were mine (and I wish it was!) I'd clean up the lily pads near the bottom edge of the frame.

[Rachel Hollander]

Hi Andrew - Another tranquil scene with beautiful colors. Good suggestions above.

TFS,
Rachel

[gail bisson]

This is lovely Andrew.
I really like the way the "finger of land" moves into the image.
The colors are lovely. Did you enhance the pinks or is that natural?
Love the reflection and the hint of fog.
I am OK with the lily pads because their diagonal line leads the eye nicely into the picture.
What is a reverse 3 stop grad filter and what does it do to the image?
Gail

[Don Railton]

Hi Gail,

I'll comment in case Andrew misses your question..
A graduated filter is a filter that holds back light on one side and not on the other. So there is a graduated drop off in light transmission through the filter as you move across the filter (and in this case its 3 stops of light lost). You can get hard graduations and soft graduations which relate to how quickly the light loss happens (ie ths slope of the gradient). These filters are often used to 'hold back' the sky in situation where the sky is very bright and the FG relatively dark. So they effectively reduce the dynamic range of the scene. Not sure what the reverse bit means (dont think it will back over you though :S3:) but it might refer to maybe holding back the FG instead of the sky.. not sure..

DON

[Diane Miller]

A reverse grad ND filter has a secondary gradient near the top where it is less dense (i.e. lighter). That is useful in cases where a sky has a strong gradient of darkening toward the top, and this kind of filter doesn't darken it as much there as a regular grad would. So this one darkened the sky but not so much at the top.

[Don Railton]

Uh Huh, make sense. So the gradient slope reverses part way through.. Thanks Diane.

[Andrew McLachlan]

Thanks folks and much appreciated...will work on the suggestions given.

Gail...a reverse grad is perfect for scenes where the sun is at or just about at the horizon as this will be the brightest section of the sky...reverse grads are darkest at the center of the filter and the gradient gets lighter as it moves towards the top of the filter, therefore, it will hold back the brightest sections of the sky without making the upper portions of the sky overly and unnaturally dark.

[Andrew McLachlan]

Hi Gail...the pinks are natural :)