| From Photoworkshop.com Double Exposure Challenge  CLICK HERE TO SEE IMAGES OF THE RUNNERS-UPLuckily, our readers aren’t afraid to go out into inclement weather! We got some beautiful and dramatic weather images this time around. Congratulations to the winners—Linda Whitney, Stephan Loeber Bottero, and Walter Quillinan—as well as our 10 runners-up, whose photos appear in the accompanying gallery.
Stormy Skies Storm clouds are always intriguing, and can give the view a sense of impending doom. Some of the most dramatic storm cloud scenes appear as the storm is approaching or leaving. Bracket your exposures, as the light changes quickly in these conditions. Sunlight breaking through dark clouds or creating rim light around the edges of a cloud is beautiful and worth shooting. It’s hard to predict when dramatic lighting will occur, but the best times to find it are just before or after a storm, when brilliant rays of sunlight burst through a bank of clouds. If you’re trying to capture these shafts of sunlight, be sure to meter for the clouds themselves and not directly at the light, as you want the rays of light to be bright. If it starts to rain, find shelter and be sure to keep your camera dry. You can also use an umbrella, or loosely wrap your camera in a clear plastic bag, leaving an opening for your lens.
This is one of nature’s most dramatic—and unpredictable—light shows in the sky. Lightning suggests danger and power in a photograph. In a situation like this, you definitely want to stay out of harm’s way. Take lightning pictures only from a distance, and preferably from inside a building or car. If you’re outside, take shelter when the storm approaches. Lightning can be photographed day or night, but you’ll get far better results at night. During the daytime, it’s best to put your camera on a tripod and aim the lens at an area in the sky where lightning is likely to strike. Base your exposure on the existing lighting conditions. Wait for a bolt and fire immediately. Your chances of getting exciting lightning shots increase dramatically after dark. You can make exposures ranging from several seconds to several minutes, and record a series of lightning bolts. You can also shoot several bolts of lightning on different frames and create a composite later in Photoshop or another image-editing program. Fog & Mist Fog is very effective when you want to evoke emotion and mood in your images. Soft morning mist rising from the land can impart a feeling of serenity, while fog shrouds a scene in soft, monochromatic hues. It’s a good idea to compose your images around subjects that are simple, powerful shapes. Rather than try to encompass a broad landscape, look for simple scenes, like the lamp and street scene that this photographer has captured. The farther that subjects are from your camera, the more they’ll lose their impact, so place the most important elements closest to your camera. Because they’re reflective and deceptively bright, fog and mist will fool your camera’s auto metering system into underexposure. Bracket exposures, and increase the exposure over your camera’s recommended reading.
Seeing one of these elusive, colorful arcs in the sky is always a wonderful experience. You may not be able to predict where a rainbow will occur, but you can increase your chances by facing away from the sun toward the dark opposing sky after a storm. While it’s still raining, use the time to scout around for possible compositions. A photograph of a rainbow in the sky alone is lovely, but it will be far more intriguing if you can line the rainbow’s end up with an interesting foreground, such as the photograph on this page with rocks in the scene. You can make the colors of a rainbow appear more saturated by underexposing your images just slightly. Take a light reading from the sky near the rainbow and then underexpose by a half or a full stop. You might also try using a polarizing filter to intensify the colors. Rotate the filter just until the hues appear more vibrant and shoot your pictures. Be careful though—in the wrong position, the rainbow may disappear altogether. We invite you to take our next Double Exposure Challenge! The subject is Wildlife—just look for the Call for Entries in this issue. CLICK HERE TO SEE IMAGES OF THE RUNNERS-UP© Copyright 2002 by Photoworkshop.com |
