blur

Shooting From the Road /  by Todd Henson

There is a particular photographic technique, or perhaps style of photography, that I don’t practice often but have thoroughly enjoyed each time I have. And that is shooting from the road, from a moving vehicle. But before we get ahead of ourselves, lets get the required warning out of the way: Please only do this as a passenger. Never shoot from the road while driving. Seems pretty obvious, right?

Panning From the Road: Farm and Motion Blur

Farm from the road

My earliest successful attempt at shooting from the road might have been a short day trip my brother and I took many years back. While driving down a road I was taken by the scene of a farm and the green fields in front of it, so I had my brother drive back and forth several times. There was no one else on this road so we didn’t get in anyone’s way. What I was hoping for was a panned image where the barn and silos were sharply in focus but the green fields closer to the car were blurred from the motion of driving by them. I was remembering as a kid how much I enjoyed staring out the side window of a car watching the blurred fields beside the road. I wanted to capture something of this in a photograph.

This was a challenging photo to create. I needed a fast enough shutter speed, and good enough panning technique, to get the barn and silos in focus. But I needed a slow enough shutter speed to capture the motion blur of the nearby field. That’s why I had my brother drive back and forth several times so I could experiment with settings until I found something that worked for me. In the end I used the following lens/camera settings: 105mm, ISO 200, f/18, 1/20 sec.

A quick note on panning, if you’re not familiar with it. Panning is where you move your camera, tracking your subject as the subject moves (or in this case as we moved past the subject). It requires a steady hand if you’re using a slow shutter speed. It takes a lot of practice but it’s worth it, and lots of fun. Give it a try if you haven’t.

Panning From the Road: House in Focus

House from the road

Another example of panning from the road was of an attractive house my father and I saw as we were driving by on our way back from a visit to Blandy Experimental Farm. This time we didn’t drive back and forth, so I needed to get it right the first time. I wasn’t looking for blurred fields or grass, just capturing a nice image of the house and its lawn, so I used a much faster shutter speed. I shot a quick burst of frames as we passed by, panning with the house from the passenger side of the car. I had no idea at the time if I captured a decent image, but when I got home I was very pleased with the results. Here are the lens/camera settings I used: 80mm, ISO 400, f/8, 1/500 sec.

Shooting the Road Ahead

On the road

Another obvious way to shoot from a moving car is to photograph the road ahead. You still have options here as far as whether you want to capture some motion blur at the sides of the road or whether you want to try to freeze all motion. In my case for each of these I opted to mostly freeze all motion, so I used faster shutter speeds. I like the perspective these photos give, facing forward with the road in front, sometimes visible far into the distance. I think there’s an aspect of storytelling to it. Here are the lens/camera settings I used for the photographs below: 58 - 80mm, ISO 400, f/8.0, 1/640 sec.

Driving through the hills

On target at mile marker 100

Tips

One of the most important tips for shooting from the road is to experiment, try different settings, see how they affect the look of the image. You can introduce intentional blur, or you can try to reduce all blur and create sharp images, or some combination of them both. Try experimenting with depth of field. I really didn’t pay too much attention with that in these photos, but it’s an option you have.

This tip applies in just about any circumstance: practice! Panning can be a challenge so it’s worth practicing any chance you get. You can practice closer to home by tracking a bird in flight or a car in motion. Try to move the camera such that you keep the subject directly on the focus point.

Another tip is to use the vibration reduction feature of your lens or camera if they have it. This can help reduce some of the natural vibration you’ll encounter from the vehicle and help you get sharp images (if that’s what you’re trying for).

It might be a good idea to wash the windows of the car before setting out, especially if they’re very dirty. I’ll be honest, though, I didn’t do that for any of these photos.

Have you ever tried shooting from the road? What were your experiences? And if you haven’t tried this, do you think you will in the future? Let me know in the comments below.

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Painterly Pursuits in Photography /  by Todd Henson

I was thinking about how sometimes painters create paintings that could be mistaken for photographs. And that naturally led me to thinking about how photographers sometimes create photographs that could be mistaken for paintings. And from there I began pondering some of the ways a photograph might be made to look painterly, many of which would involve heavy post-processing, likely using Photoshop to craft a painting out of a photo. But I also thought about the various ways a photograph could be made painterly mostly in camera with any post-processing occurring strictly in Lightroom.

And so I sought out a few photographs that I’d created with a more painterly intent, ones I’d not yet processed, and took them through Lightroom to finish them. Most of the post-processing is similar in nature to that I do with any other photograph, adjusting exposure, highlights, shadows, white and black points, white balance, color balance, etc. The majority of what makes these photos painterly was done in camera. I did, however, make adjustments in Lightroom that might be considered overkill for a typical photograph, things like over-saturating colors or pushing texture too much in one direction or the other (affecting contrast in interesting ways).

Trees in Autumn

The first photo used a simple technique to distort the scene, giving it the impression of paint brushed onto a canvas. How was it done? Some of you may guess by looking at the photo. I found a pond surrounded by bright autumn foliage and pointed the camera at the reflections in the water and experimented with various shutter speeds to see the different looks they gave. Some seemed to give the impression of brushed on paint, and in post processing I accentuated that by adjusting the contrast in various ways (texture, highlights, shadows, white and black point, etc). I also flipped the photo so the sky was at the top, as we’d see in the scene or a painting, but the opposite of what we typically see reflected in a pond.

Autumnal Abstract

For the second photo I once again took advantage of the reflections of the colorful autumn foliage, but this time I decided to go with a more abstract composition. I focused in on a small patch of color and patterns and zoomed in enough you can’t as easily tell what the subject is. Instead it’s just a painting about color and pattern. And this being the case I had no problem adjusting some of the colors in Lightroom, making some of them brighter and more vibrant.

Fiery Fall Foliage

Finally, for the third photo I decided to include the actual scene instead of just reflections. But I still wanted a painterly look. Thankfully, the scene, itself, had a painterly look to it with the late afternoon sun lighting up some of the colorful leaves across the pond. I was also creating a number of long exposures, letting any breeze slightly blur the leaves, while also sometimes experimenting with moving the zoom or focus ring during the exposure. If you move the zoom ring during exposure you can create some interesting streaks and blurs as you actually zoom into or out of the scene. By moving the focus ring during exposure you can similarly create some interesting blurs as you capture things in and out of focus at the same time. In this particular case I don’t think I moved either zoom or focus rings, instead just letting the breeze move some of the leaves around for the 1 second exposure. I then made further adjustments in Lightroom that contributed to the slightly blurry feel, and made some creative exposure adjustments beyond the already brightly illuminated foliage.

All of these photos also took advantage of a Singh-Ray Gold-n-Blue polarizing filter to shift and accentuate the colors even more. The trip to this pond was all about experimenting, about trying to use various techniques to alter the look and feel of the images, and in some cases perhaps creating photographs with a more painterly feel. I’ll let you decide whether or not I was successful.

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Tips For Blurring Moving Water /  by Todd Henson

I’ve been asked in the past how to blur moving water from rivers and waterfalls in a photograph. It all comes down to shutter speed. The slower the shutter speed the more blur in the water. Below are a number of tips to help you do this. You don’t have to follow all of these tips to blur water. Pick whichever ones you’re able to use. Just realize some of them may not get the shutter speed as slow as you’d like. That’s when you may need to try the other tips.

Stabilize Your Camera

If you want a sharp image of everything but the water you’ll first need to stabilize your camera. The best way to do this is to put it on a good tripod. If you don’t have a tripod you can try resting the camera on something stable such as a stone wall or a large rock or tree. Just be careful not to let the camera drop.

Use a Remote Shutter Release or Self-Timer

To reduce the chance of introducing shake into the camera during the exposure it’s best not to press the shutter button with your finger to start the exposure. Two options for avoiding this are a remote shutter release, or setting the camera’s self-timer such that your exposure begins some number of seconds after you press the shutter button.

Using the self-timer is the least expensive option if your camera supports it, though you will lose a little flexibility in choosing exactly when to start the exposure.

There are two options for remote shutter releases: cable releases that attach to a special connector on your camera and wireless releases. At present I use a simple cable release that just presses and optionally locks the shutter. Some higher-end cable (and wireless) releases include intervalometer features which let you take a photo every so many seconds for some period of time.

Shoot Early, Late, or on an Overcast Day

It’s best if it’s not a bright sunny day as the sunlight can blow out the white highlights in the water. Try to photograph very early or very late, before the sun is up or after it has gone down. Or pick an overcast day when clouds will hide the sun. This reduces the quantity of light in the scene, reducing the chances of blowing out highlights, and requiring a longer exposure in your camera, increasing your chances of blurring the water.

This was shot on an overcast morning. Less light meant a longer exposure. ISO 200, aperture f/36, shutter speed 15 seconds.

Adjust Your ISO

Set your ISO to the lowest setting your camera allows. The ISO controls how sensitive your camera’s sensor is to light. The lowest setting, for example, 100 or 200, will require more light to make an exposure. Your camera will need more time to collect more light which will help you achieve the slow shutter speed you’re after.

Stop Down Your Aperture

Stop down your aperture as far as you can. To do this use a larger f-stop number, such as f/16, f/32, etc. This closes down the aperture, making a smaller opening that light will need to travel through, requiring more time for the camera to gather enough light to make the exposure. This lets you shoot using slower shutter speeds. Be aware, though, that the very smallest apertures can cause diffraction, which may reduce the sharpness of your photo. If this happens you’ll need to open up the aperture just a bit.

A wider aperture results in a faster shutter speed allowing you to see more detail in the water. ISO 200, aperture f/4, shutter speed 1/50 second.

A smaller aperture results in a slower shutter speed allowing you to blur the water. ISO 200, aperture f/11, shutter speed 1/8 second.

A wide aperture results in a faster shutter speed, freezing action and showing more detail in the water. ISO 320, aperture f/6.3, shutter speed 1/1250 second.

A small aperture results in a slower shutter speed, helping convey action by blurring the water. ISO 320, aperture f/25, shutter speed 1/60 second.

Use a Polarizing Filter

If everything above still isn’t enough to slow the shutter speed down enough to create the blur you’re after then you may need to resort to filters that fit over your lens. The first to try is a polarizing filter if you already have one.

A polarizing filter is often used to reduce reflections and glare on surfaces such as water and leaves, to create richer colors, and to darken skies. A side effect of these filters is reducing the amount of light that reaches the sensor, usually by about 1 to 2 stops. This isn’t a lot but it might be enough to get the shutter speed slow enough to blur the water.

Using a polarizing filter and a small aperture helped slow down the shutter speed, blurring the water from the fountains. ISO 200, aperture f/25, shutter speed 1.6 seconds.

Use a Neutral Density (ND) Filter

If nothing else will get the shutter speed slow enough you’ll want to invest in a neutral density filter. Think of this as sunglasses for your camera lens. It’s a dark filter that reduces the amount of light entering the lens. Neutral density filters are available in a range of levels, some reducing 1 stop of light, some 3 stops, some 5, 10 or even 15 stops of light. You can even find variable neutral density filters that let you turn the filter like a polarizer to change the density of the filter. With neutral density filters you’ll be able to slow the shutter speed down as much as you’d like.

You can also stack filters, using multiple neutral density filters to slow things down even more. And you can stack a polarizing filter and neutral density filters. Just be aware that if you stack too many filters you may begin to see the filters at the corners of the image. If this happens you either need to remove some of the filters or crop the image when you’re finished.

A polarizing filter in the middle of the day allowed a slow exposure, but not slow enough to really blur (or still) the moving water. ISO 200, aperture f/22, shutter speed 1/8 second.

A polarizing filter and a 5-stop neutral density filter in the middle of the day allowed a slow enough exposure to blur (or mostly still) the moving water. ISO 200, aperture f/22, shutter speed 4 seconds.

It's reasonably early in the morning without a filter. ISO 200, aperture f/11, shutter speed 1/80 second.

Adding a Singh-Ray Gold-N-Blue Polarizer and a 10-stop neutral density filter shifted the colors and slowed the shutter speed way down, introducing a lot of blur into the water. ISO 200, aperture f/11, shutter speed 67 seconds.

In this triptych I used a Singh-Ray Vari-N-Duo filter, which combines a polarizing filter with a variable neutral density filter, to gradually slow the shutter speed down by increasing the amount of neutral density. All images are ISO 200 with an aperture of f/25. The left image has a shutter speed of 1/8 second. The center image has a shutter speed of 4/5 second. The right image has a shutter speed of 8 seconds.

I hope these tips for blurring moving water have been useful to you. It can be a lot of fun and it can really add a nice dynamic to a photograph. So head out there and try a few of them out, see what kinds of interesting photographs you can create.

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