Bosphorus: Love, Peace, Charm

[keladawy]

Bosphorus, Ortakoy, Istanbul, Turkey
NIKON D3100, 24mm, 30 sec, f/25, ISO 400

[Donald]

A very fine image of a wonderful city. It works very well as a B & W.

[AB26]

Khaled, I would love to see that in colour.

I see you used an aperture of f25, any spesific reason for doing it? What I have learned from what I read in CiC, using such small apertures will actually degrade the quality of the image. Using an aperture that maximises the efficiency of the lens you are using should produce sharper images. Nothing wrong with your image, I am just wondering about the f25. You most probably used a kit lens (18-55mm) at 24mm.

Maybe I am wrong in my way of thinking but I try not to use an aperture smaller than f11. High end Pro lenses should produce sharp images right trough the Aperture range, I do not have such lenses, therefor I avoid wide open and very small apertures.
Shooting a landscape like that should not present any problem with DOF.

I like the image although I am not so sure about the side of the bridge "hanging in midair" maybe I am looking for a pillar because my brain wants it to rest on something. Then again, I like the "clean" view of the city lights under the bridge without the obstruction of another pillar.

[keladawy]

Andre, Thank you
1. Actually, I felt that colours didn't add much to this image, that's why I favoured B&W over colours.
2. Regarding the f25, it was just for DOF, and I didn't know about the relation between aperture and quality, so it seems I have to read more about it. and you're right, this is the standard 18-55 lens
3. Your comment re. the left pillar is interesting

Thank you for the valuable advise, and many thanks for Donald too

[Dave Humphries]

Hi Khaled,

I agree with Andre on both suggestions.

I did wonder whether you'd done it to get the long shutter speed to smooth the water.

Regarding the f25, it was just for DOF

You can find out what you need by using a DoF calculator, such as the one here at CiC.

I dialled 24mm on your 1.5 crop factor body and chose Andre's suggested f/11, basically, focusing at around 50m gives everything sharp from 2.5m to infinity. f/25 was vast overkill for DoF purposes and will take you into diffraction, although that's often not as bad as people make out - you certainly won't notice it in an image downsized for web use like this, so no real harm was done by using f/25.

Cheers,

[Loose Canon]

Hi Khaled!

Nice shot! Sometimes you get what you get as far as the camera left bridge pier (or lack of!) is concerned. If it gives a sense of hanging in midair, it also gives a sense of moving on into infinity! Or for that matter, anything you see it as. Maybe you could have changed your point of view, or maybe not!

As for the f/25?

I probably would have shot this at least at f/22. Surely f/16 at the widest.

And not for DoF considerations. At this distance you could have opened up quite a bit more and still had an appropriate DoF. I would have done it to get the “starburst” effect that you have gotten from your point light sources (i.e. bridge lights, etc.) and to get a longer shutter speed to smooth the water and get the smoother reflections. In fact, I might have even considered an ND filter to get an even longer shutter, smoother water, and nice reflections in the water at the same stopped down aperture.

I think your choice of aperture has added to, rather than diminished the results of your shot. The “starburst” effect you have looks great to me and sometimes it pays to not get too bogged down with the “science” or be afraid to shoot at particular settings just because there is a “study” saying you shouldn’t. You will never know what is pushing the limits too much until you know where the limits are for your eye and equipment. I just can’t imagine the IQ being so degraded at your chosen aperture that the shot is less than it could be.

In fact, I think your shot is evidence to the contrary!

[Dave Humphries]

'Good catch' on f/25 for the star-burst effect Terry, I should have thought of that

[keladawy]

Dave:
Thank you for pointing me to both the tutorial and the calculator

Terry:
Thank you for the star burst effect note