Sunset on the Bay

[joebranko]

This picture taken at sunset on a very cold January afternoon. The water in the bay has frozen into plates of ice about 5cm thick and which have heaved forming a rough undulating surface. The dots in the distance on the right are geese coming in for a landing at a park adjacent to the bay.
1/60", f8, 50mm 100ISO. My lens had a circular polarizing filter on it, with which I tried to reduce the intensity of the light from the sky. I am never sure if I have the filter rotated correctly or not, so I am not sure what effect it has had. Comments and critiques please.

[Shadowman]

Nice capture of the sky.

[joebranko]

Nice capture of the sky.

Thanks John.

[Downrigger]

This is very nice - really has some beautiful light. Whatever you did with your circular polarizer was fine. It has more effect when you are shooting "across" the sun rather than with or against it so maybe not a lot here. I like everything about your image except the pier - which seems intrusive on an otherwise soft and luminous subject.

I usually don't have trouble getting a sense of the effect I am going to get with a circular polarizer by rotating it as I view the scene I am shooting. As I rotate the filter I am usually watching two things: 1. saturation (darkness) and contrast in the sky and 2. brightness of reflections (off water or snow). For many situations, something less than the maximum effect is most helpful and for a scene I am serious about I often "bracket" shots with different rotational positions of the filter or include a version without it.

[Wavelength]

That row of birds in flight makes this image very special....; very nice cloud pattern too

Regards

[mknittle]

That row of birds in flight makes this image very special....; very nice cloud pattern too

Regards

What he said. plus nice description.

[flashback]

This is one of those images that can't be appreciated other than on full magnification, it's then that you can see the ice and feel the chill. My only suggestion would be a slight crop on the RHS, say about halfway from the edge of the image to the first goose.

[joebranko]

This is very nice - really has some beautiful light. Whatever you did with your circular polarizer was fine. It has more effect when you are shooting "across" the sun rather than with or against it so maybe not a lot here. I like everything about your image except the pier - which seems intrusive on an otherwise soft and luminous subject.

I usually don't have trouble getting a sense of the effect I am going to get with a circular polarizer by rotating it as I view the scene I am shooting. As I rotate the filter I am usually watching two things: 1. saturation (darkness) and contrast in the sky and 2. brightness of reflections (off water or snow). For many situations, something less than the maximum effect is most helpful and for a scene I am serious about I often "bracket" shots with different rotational positions of the filter or include a version without it.

Thanks Mark. This is very helpful. I was looking into the sun and trying to get the effect of a graduated filter. Thanks for this. I agree about the pier, but I could not get into a better position for the shot; I looked at cloning it out but felt I could not do so without messing it up. Also cropping it out would have lost me too much of that lovely orange......

[joebranko]

That row of birds in flight makes this image very special....; very nice cloud pattern too

Regards

Thank you Nandakumar. Really appreciated your comments.

[Manfred M]

Joe - a polarizing filter will have maximum effect when you are pointing your lens at a right angle to the sun.

There is zero impact when the sun is directly in front or behind you. Here the sun is just off the image to camera left, so virtually no impact, other than lengthening your exposure by around 2 of eV (2-stops).

[joebranko]

This is one of those images that can't be appreciated other than on full magnification, it's then that you can see the ice and feel the chill. My only suggestion would be a slight crop on the RHS, say about halfway from the edge of the image to the first goose.

Thanks Jack. I tried the crop you suggested and is does improve it.