afterglow pics

[crisscross]

these days we seem to get less sunset drama (clearer air?) but more interest in the afterglow - but does it make an image? The sky colours are fine, but there seems a weakness of composition beyond that? (more examples in the rest of that gallery)

http://www.pbase.com/crisscross/skyline

[Colin Southern]

Hi Chris,

My suggestion is to try to anticipate where the afterglow will occur - frame a good composition in the foreground - and use the afterglow as a combined backdrop / "cherry on the top"

In particular, wide angle lenses allow you to get agressive perspectives (aka something nice in the immediate foreground, without having to worry too much about mid-distance elements).

Cheers,

Colin - pbase.com/cjsouthern

[crisscross]

Hi Chris,

My suggestion is to try to anticipate where the afterglow will occur - frame a good composition in the foreground - and use the afterglow as a combined backdrop / "cherry on the top"

Cheers,

Colin - photo.net/photos/colinsouthern

Thank you Colin. I think your advice is sound in principle, and your own style is consistent and great of its type - I am jealous of the complete double rainbows and 'cloud factory' shots - but I am not normally a great fan of WA landcape and will be applying the advice a bit differently when opportunity arises, maybe even this afternoon.

Chris

[Colin Southern]

You're very welcome Chris - and thanks for the compliment

The double rainbow was definately a case of "right place, right time" - I needed a 14mm lens on a full frame camera to capture it - AND - the image you see is uncropped. Of course it was all gone a couple of minutes later.

The cloud factory shot was a labour of love - it took me 3 trips to get the tide co-inciding with daybreak (water only reaches that location about 1/2 hour either side of high tide). I had about 6 layers of clothing on - and a heavy frost appeared on my camera bag whilst I was waiting for sunrise (not to mention a passing interest from the police wondering what this idiot was doing out on the mudflats in the wee small hours of the morning!).

As you say, you no doubt have a very different style of shooting than me - with WA lenses I tend to put the horizon at 1/3 down from the top (or 1/3 up from the bottom) and then change the elevation of the camera until foreground objects assume the desired perspective (often only 12 to 18 inches above ground level).

I do quite a bit of afterglow type photography - found that it took a bit of getting used to, as the light looks rather weak to the naked eye, but the camera seems to pick up on it quite nicely - hardest thing is to avoid going out of gamut when trying to print the strong saturated colours brightly.

Cheers,

Colin - pbase.com/cjsouthern

[Davey]

I really like some of those. Made me wonder if it was possible to capture a green flash. I don't know if anyone has since they are so quick I guess it's hard.

Have you or anyone else here managed that? That would be awesome to see.

[Colin Southern]

I really like some of those. Made me wonder if it was possible to capture a green flash. I don't know if anyone has since they are so quick I guess it's hard.

Have you or anyone else here managed that? That would be awesome to see.

Hi Nocturne - I'm a bit confused (a relatively normal state of being for me!) - what do you mean by "green flash"? Green flash of what exactly?

Cheers,

Colin - pbase.com/cjsouthern

[Davey]

Aha searching for explanation online http://mintaka.sdsu.edu/GF/ so people have caught them.

It's an optical phenomena that often seen immediately after the sun goes down (or sometimes just before up) and last for a second on average.

[Colin Southern]

Thanks for that.

Not something I've heard of before. If they only last a few seconds then I doubt I'll be capturing one any time soon - most of my morning exposures are measured in minutes!

... will keep an eye out for them though.

Cheers,

Colin - pbase.com/cjsouthern

[crisscross]

Aha searching for explanation online http://mintaka.sdsu.edu/GF/ so people have caught them.

It's an optical phenomena that often seen immediately after the sun goes down (or sometimes just before up) and last for a second on average.

An interesting pheneomenon and must make sure I don't accidentally erase or edit any out (hopes).

However, with the sun actually visible, the more usual photographic challenge is to get a clean edge to the sun itself - for that I think there has to be a slightly mucky atmosphere. Can't help noticing that in the examples following your URL, the sun is more distorted to the elliptical than in any I have. I presume the jaggies are from low-res postings, but maybe they are also a con-commitent feature?

[Davey]

Unsure about it since only heard about them but never seen photo before never mind tried to capture one so no experience to make educated guess. I read article about best places and conditions to see them a while ago. Article had stuff about blue jets, ELVEs and sprites too, looking around there are pics of those too although conditions seem more unusual to capture some of those successfully.

Many seem to be photographed by the same researchers with specialist gear (low light gear and from aircraft etc). Wow what a job researching such phenomena.