Sun rise and sun set

[rtk]

What is the best exposure setting for sun rise and sun set to get vivid colours

[Manfred M]

Unfortunately, there is no really easy answer here, for a number of reasons. The best approach is trial and error. When the sun is rising or setting it very close to the horizon and the characteristics of the light are changing rapidly. Other factors, like cloud cover, and the scene you are trying to shoot will affect the settings you will be shooting with/

As a starting point, I would set my camera to as high an ISO setting as I am okay with the noise level on (800 to 3200 on my cameras), leave the aperture wide open and start at 1/60th of a second or faster and see what I get. Don't use the image on the screen to evaluate you shot; but use the histogram. If you are shooting into the sun, chances are you will be shooting in conditions where you will blow out your highlights and block up your shadow detail.

If you are shooting in RAW, you can set you colour balance in post-production, but if you are shooting in jpeg mode; chances are you will like the colours better if you set the white balance to either daylight or cloudy settings, rather than auto white balance. The vivid colours are either added in post-production or if your camera has a colour control setting; increasing contrast and saturation levels will work for jpegs.

Many of the really well done sunrise or sunset scenes are taken with a graduated neutral density filter in front of the camera lens. I tend to shoot either a 2-stop or 3-stop grad for this type of work.

[Dave Humphries]

Hi "rtk",

I can only endorse Manfred's suggestion to get out there and try it, with the settings he provides, certainly some success is possible without a GND filter.

Could you do me a favour please?
Could you Edit your Profile and put your first name in the Real Name field and where you are (roughly) in the Location field? - thanks.

Welcome to the CiC forums from ...

[Stagecoach]

Hi rtk

As Manfred and Dave have said there really is no right answer, it's certainly trial and error. One way to start is to set your camera in Aperture priority take a shot, note the settings used, look at the image and histogram then change to manual and adjust the settings until you get the result you are after.

Looking through some of my old sunrise shots here's an idea of the settings I used in 'Manual';

f16, 1/5th s, ISO200

f16, 1/6th s, ISO200

f22, 1/125th s, ISO200


Note, all taken on a tripod hence was not too woried about the low speed. These images are low res, only 900x600 around 60Kb that I use for emailing.

[Colin Southern]

What is the best exposure setting for sun rise and sun set to get vivid colours

The one that uses close to (but not more than) the full dynamic range of the sensor. The highlight clipping warning ("blinkies") and histogram are your friends here - and be sure to shoot RAW.