Eloquent Images by Gary Hart
Insight, information, and inspiration for the inquisitive nature photographer
Dinner Can Wait
Posted on July 3, 2023
Glacial Twilight, Tasman Lake Reflection, New Zealand
Sony a7R V
Sony 24-105 f/4 G
ISO 100
f/16
13 seconds
Among the (many) highlights of the New Zealand workshop Don Smith and I do each year is the short but steep hike to the Tasman Lake vista. Somehow the people at Aoraki / Mt. Cook National Park have managed to cram the .4 mile trail (I measured) with 334 stairs (I counted), but once you’ve caught your breath at the top of the trail, the reward for your effort is a 270 degree view that includes 12,200 foot Mt. Cook (New Zealand’s tallest peak), Tasman Glacier (covered in black rock in this image), turquoise Tasman Lake dotted with icebergs, the Tasman Valley, and a host of snowcapped Southern Alps peaks.
Because free-soloing this Tasman view climb isn’t for everyone, Don and I have an alternate spot for those who don’t feel like mountain climbers. This year, after dropping me and my Tasman Lake crew at the trailhead, Don and our driver Steve took the (larger) remaining group to a nearby bridge across the Hooker River, where they could photograph many of the same peaks with the river in the foreground. The plan was for both groups to photograph sunset at our respective locations, then reconnect for dinner while waiting for the sky to darken enough for (another) Milky Way shoot.
Normally I’m not crazy about setting rigid meet-up times following a shoot because it’s always impossible predict what conditions we’ll have and exactly when the show will be over. In this case we had enough cell service at both locations to allow us to include a little “We’ll let you know if we need more time,” flexibility in the plans. That turned out to be a good thing.
I’ve probably been up to this view at least a dozen times now, and each time it’s different. And much like approaching Tunnel View in Yosemite, you have no idea what’s in store until the view is upon you. The typical variables are the clouds, the amount snow at lake level, the number of icebergs and their location on the lake, and the color of the lake (always some shade of glacial green/blue).
Also like the Tunnel View experience, the reaction of people seeing this view for the first time is a true personal treat. This year’s experience was no exception, especially since the view this evening was among the best I’ve ever seen here. It checked most variables mentioned above: thin clouds swirled beneath the peaks; there was more ice on the lake than I’ve ever seen, most of it floating in the best part of the scene; and the lake’s color was off the charts. The only thing missing was snow at lake level.
Though sunset was still 45 minutes away, the light on the swirling clouds kicked us into gear instantly. As I worked on compositions ranging from extremely wide to moderate telephoto, it seemed the departing sun was taking the clouds with it—by the time the last sunlight kissed the tips of the peaks, the only clouds remaining were distant cirrus.
At that point it seemed like the show was over and a couple in my group started to pack up their gear and head back down to wait for the van. But I suggested that since we were already up here, and there was potential for some nice post-sunset twilight light, we may as well hang out to see what happens. A couple of minutes later I got a text from the other group saying they were wrapping up, but I responded that we’d need at least 20 more minutes—10 to see what the sky does, and 10 to make it back down to the trailhead.
About that time I took my eyes off the sky to glance at the lake and did an actual double-take. In all the years I’ve come here, I’ve never seen the lake surface still enough for a true reflection, but that’s exactly what was forming. I pointed it out to the others and we all snapped back into action. By this time it was fairly dark—dark enough that while waiting for one exposure to complete I was able to fire off a text to Don and Steve saying that we need more time, to just go to dinner without us.
This composition is a version of one I’d settled on earlier, before the reflection started. I’d quickly realized that biggest problem with this otherwise perfect scene was that a wide shot would require including either too much fairly empty sky, or too much of the jumbled and very bland rock surrounding the lake (which is why I always hope for snow at lake level). It’s difficult to tell from this image, but the slope down to the lake is quite steep—not vertical, but steep enough that it would require a little skill and great care by anyone trying to pick their way down to lake level. But this steepness allowed me to step about 5 feet back from the edge and use nearby (much more interesting) boulders to block most of the ugly lakeside.
Since these foreground rocks were between 5 and 10 feet from my camera, I had to be careful about depth of field. But because nothing in my frame was moving, after stopping down to f/16 I didn’t need to make any ISO compromises to speed my shutter—I just kept my ISO at 100, focused on a spot about 10 feet away, and dialed in the shutter speed that gave me the exposure I wanted. In this case that was 13 seconds (which should give you an idea how dark it had become). This long shutter speed had the added benefit of smoothing very slight motion disturbing lake surface, helping the reflection stand out even better.
Another thing I didn’t fully appreciate until I compared this image to previous images from this view was how much more blue there was in this lake that normally tends toward green. I attribute the color to the fact that by this time there was no direct sunlight anywhere, so the only source of light was the deep blue sky, which was still reflecting from the lake.
We made it back down the hill in near darkness, arriving at the trailhead at about the same time Steve returned from dropping the rest of the group at the restaurant. That night’s buffet was a little pricey but almost as spectacular as the view we’d just photographed and worth every penny, especially given the appetites we’d worked up. We finished the night with a fantastic Milky Way shoot just up the road from where the rest of the group had photographed sunset, then slept quite well back at our hotel in Twizel.
Join Don and Me in New Zealand next year
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Big Reflections
Variations on a Tree
Posted on June 26, 2023
Winter Chill, Lake Wanaka, New Zealand
Sony a7R V
Sony 100 – 400 GM
ISO 100
f/18
30 seconds
I returned from New Zealand Saturday evening, a bit battered and bruised by jet lag and a brief but quite unpleasant battle with food poisoning (or norovirus), but nevertheless already missing this beautiful country that feels more like my home away from home each time I visit. I love everything about New Zealand—its unparalleled scenery, its friendly people, its tasty food, its pristine environment (the air, lakes, rivers, streets, and even the public restrooms), its meticulously maintained hiking trails, and even its (almost but not quite) ubiquitous sheep. Oh wait a minute—not the bacon. I definitely do not love New Zealand’s flaccid bacon (bacon should snap, not tear like soggy tissue).
Because I’m still in recovery mode, as I did last week, this week’s blog will be a new image attached to a revived and (significantly) updated prior post. I hope to forego the self-plagiarism and resume my regular schedule next week. In the meantime…
I’m incredibly blessed to make my living guiding enthusiastic photographers to many of our planet’s most beautiful locations: New Zealand, Iceland, Yosemite, and Grand Canyon, among many. While this makes my life far too rich for complaint, let me say (without complaining) that a particular challenge imposed by frequent return visits to the same locations is finding unique ways to photograph them.
My usual approach at these familiar locations is to identify appealing relationships and framing, then use my camera’s exposure variables to play with the scene’s “creative triad”: motion, light, and depth. Whether it’s blurring or freezing water, emphasizing shape by going dark for a silhouette or bright for a high-key effect, or depth-of-field from narrow to extreme to emphasize depth, I love playing with these variables to create something unique.
One particularly challenging subject is the solitary willow tree near the south shore of Lake Wanaka in New Zealand. This striking tree just stands by itself in a lake (most of the time), with little motion, silhouette, or depth of field opportunities. But each time I visit Wanaka, I challenge myself to find a version of the scene that’s different from anything I’ve captured, a challenge that grows harder with each visit. And just because I don’t have my full arsenal of creativity weapons doesn’t mean I’ve arrived completely disarmed.
With a compromised (but not quite eliminated) creative triad, my creative options at Lake Wanaka rely more heavily on some combination of weather and water conditions, juxtaposition of visual elements, focal length, and framing. And as you can see in the gallery at the bottom of this post, the conditions at the time of my visit play the largest role in the way I approach this scene. The weather conditions for sure, but also the color and light, the quality of the reflection, and whether it’s day or night.
Because a picture is worth a thousand words, I’ll spare you long explanations and share some examples with a few words of explanation
(Click the image for the blog post describing its capture)
First, a little bit about this beautiful tree. It grew from, of all things, a fence post placed near the lake around 1940, at a time when the water was lower than it is in most of these images. Spend much time in New Zealand and it’s not hard to recognize that New Zealanders are especially proud and protective of their indigenous flora and fauna. Which might explain why most New Zealanders view the attention this non-native willow tree receives with emotion that ranges from bewilderment to downright irritation. These feelings seem to intensify with proximity to Wanaka.
In March 2020 (clearly not a great month) the tree was vandalized by person/persons unknown (though I’ve been told that local authorities have a good idea who it is) who sawed off several branches, including the distinctive lowest branch that arced downward and nearly grazed the lake surface. And while this branchectomy (I made that word up) did cost the tree some of its aesthetic appeal, its beautiful spirit persists, and the Wanaka Willow remains a striking feature to view and photograph. (It won’t be difficult for anyone browsing the gallery images below to distinguish the before and after images.)
Wanaka Reflection, New Zealand
New Zealand’s winter clouds are a frequent source of delight. This image was captured late-morning (not usually great light), but the clouds and reflection were so nice that I couldn’t resist shooting. I chose a horizontal composition because it allowed me to include more clouds and reflection, while filling the frame top-to-bottom with the tree and its reflection, than a vertical composition would.
Red Sunset, Lake Wanaka, New Zealand
Juxtaposition is almost always a prime consideration. I especially love the snow-capped Southern Alps across the lake, so all things equal, I’ll usually position myself with the mountains in the background (the other options are trees and shoreline, or the town of Wanaka itself). In this scene the main event was the spectacular tangerine sunset, perhaps the most vivid color I’ve ever witnessed in New Zealand.
With the most intense color in the direction of the peaks, I set up facing that direction, taking care not to merge the tree with tiny Ruby Island. The reflection was slightly disturbed by gentle undulations on the lake’s surface, so I added a 6-stop neutral density filter to smooth the water. The resulting 30-second exposure glazed the lake surface and softened the distant fast-moving clouds just enough.
Gray Dawn, Lake Wanaka, New Zealand
But it’s not always about background juxtaposition. For example, on the morning following the sunset image above, the morning fog was so thick it rendered the background completely irrelevant. I chose a spot that best emphasized the tree’s shape, and that allowed me to fill my foreground with a mosaic of barely submerged stones. I played with my polarizer until I found an orientation that revealed the nearby stones while sparing the tree’s reflection. (Hold a gun to my head and ask me to name a favorite Wanaka Tree image and I might just choose this one.)
Starry Night, Lake Wanaka, New Zealand
Sky Light,The Milky Way and City Lights, Lake Wanaka, New Zealand
One aspect of the conditions I have some control over is whether it’s day or night. By going out after dark on a clear night, I can include stars—depending on the timing and my position, I can also juxtapose the tree with the Milky Way and a background feature.
In June, when I’m usually in New Zealand, for the first half of the night including the tree with the Milky Way also means including the lights of Wanaka. While that’s not necessarily a bad thing, I generally prefer avoiding city lights. I made an exception on this chilly night when a low fog bank obscured most of the direct artificial light, absorbing and reflecting Wanaka’s glow to paint the lower half of the frame gold.
Milky Way and Reflection, Lake Wanaka, New Zealand
If I wait until the night hours closer to sunrise, the Milky Way has rotated westward, away from the city lights. On the morning I captured the image on the right, the Milky Way was well on its way to setting. Rather than staying up all night for this image, I simply rose a couple of hours before sunrise to make this image (the beauty of having a hotel within walking distance of the tree). Unfortunately, by the time I made it out to the tree, the sky was just starting to brighten and lose contrast, and the Milky Way had rotated so far west that including it with the tree meant also including nearby shoreline and trees too. I have visions of making it out there a couple of hours earlier, but so far haven’t had a clear enough night on any subsequent visit.
For the image at the top of this frame, captured the same night as the image that includes the city glow, I decide to forego the Milky Way entirely and just concentrate on the tree and its reflection. The result was another of my favorite, and most successful, images.
Lone Willow Reflection, Lake Wanaka, New Zealand
I wasn’t really crazy about the sky when I captured this image, but I liked the background peaks and low-hanging clouds. So I retreated down the lakeshore, away from the tree, and then climbed a gentle slope to distance myself even further, then used a telephoto to enlarge the tree and shrink the distance between it and the mountains and clouds. (If I had it to do over again, I’d have moved slightly right to avoid merging the tree with the island.)
Reflection on the Rocks, Wanaka Willow Tree, New Zealand
The beautiful clouds that had started the evening over the Southern Alps had move quickly across the scene were exiting southeast and out of my frame. It wasn’t long before my options were to hold my position and photograph the tree with the mountains and no clouds, or reposition myself to feature the best of the clouds against the town of Wanaka. I went with the clouds.
Because I saw the potential for a beautiful sunset, I went went wide to maximize the sky, choosing my 12 – 24 lens. Instead of filling most of the frame with colorful clouds, I positioned myself so the reflection mirrored the arc caused by the last of the retreating clouds, creating a frame for the tree. I was aware that I was picking up a few structures on the opposite lakeshore, but felt that was justifiable compromise to ensure the best clouds and sunset color potential combined with snowy peaks.
The light was beautiful when I started, but it just kept improving as the color ramped up. Every few minutes I repositioned myself to keep the tree framed beneath the shifting clouds. To feature the flat, multi-toned rocks visible beneath a thin veneer of reflective water, I dropped my tripod and moved it a foot or so into the water. And finally, I shifted just enough for the trunk to split the gap between two distant peaks. Going vertical allowed me to get the full arc of clouds and their reflection above the rocks, with less far lakeshore than a horizontal composition would have.
Winter Chill, Lake Wanaka, New Zealand
This year’s (2023) Wanaka visit featured persistent dense, high fog. Perhaps not the dazzling conditions we’d all hoped for, but the longer I spent with the scene, the more I started to appreciate the opportunities. With fairly bland clouds overhead, my goal this morning was to isolate the tree, its reflection, and distant Ruby Island. To do this, I used my my 100-400 lens, positioned myself as far back as I could, and aligned the tree and island so they were close but not merged.
The reflection this morning was visible but slightly disturbed by gentle waves rolling across the lake surface. With a focal length of 166mm, I was a little concerned about keeping both the tree and the background sharp, so I stopped down to f/18, temporarily removing my camera from the tripod to focus on trees behind me that were slightly farther away the the willow (read about hyperfocal focusing). To create a more ethereal effect in the reflection, I returned the pre-focused camera to the tripod and added my Breakthrough 6-stop Dark Polarizer for a 30-second exposure that gave the lake a beautiful gauzy sheen.
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Variations on a Tree
Click any image to scroll through the gallery LARGE
Greetings from Down Under
Posted on June 19, 2023
Milky Way Reflection, Lake Wakatipu, New Zealand
Sony a7R V
Sony 14mm f/1.8 GM
ISO 6400
f/1.8
15 seconds
It’s hard enough sticking to my (self-imposed) weekly blog schedule when I’m home and just doing the daily stuff necessary to keep my business running. But for the last week Don Smith and I have been cavorting about the New Zealand countryside with a dozen awestruck photographers. So I’ve dusted off a still relevant blog post from 4 years ago, updated it, and added a brand new image (from this trip) and description.
What’s my problem?
I share a lot of Milky Way images (and when I say Milky Way, I’m referring to the brilliant core of our home galaxy). But then it seems does everyone else. And when I look at some of the other visually dazzling Milky Way images posted online, I realize I’m working at something of a disadvantage—not because of deficient equipment (not even close), a physical or mental handicap (though as the years spin by…), or even because I think the world is unfair (maybe it is, but it’s been pretty good to me). No, my disadvantage is solely the result of self-imposed “rules” that prevent me from photographing anything that can’t be captured with a single click.
Single-click shooting means no focus stacking, no HDR, no blending separately captured foreground and sky. In other words, if I can’t get what I want in one frame, I don’t get it. It’s not that I think there’s anything wrong with combining images—image blending is a tremendous tool that allows digital photographers to transcend the limitations of film photography. And it’s not because blending is “too technical” for me—having spent 20 years working in the tech industry, I know my way around a computer and have actually played a fair amount with blending images (it’s not rocket science). No, I don’t blend images simply because, as beautiful as they might be, I get no personal satisfaction from results that feel artificial to me. And if photography doesn’t make you happy, what’s the point?
Every time I bring this up, someone gets defensive, feeling like I’m saying that there’s something wrong with blending images. There isn’t!* I enjoy viewing the work of photographers who blend images to elevate their art. So if you blend and enjoy it, please go forth and blend to your heart’s content (and keep those defensive comments to yourself). This is about me, and what makes me happy.
*As long as it’s not used to deceive.
Milky Way capture
I’m frequently asked about my processing for Milky Way images, and I’ve always been a little reluctant to share a lot because I’m not an expert, I don’t blend, and my Milky Way workflow is always a work in process. Nevertheless, I’m asked enough that I’ve decided it might nevertheless help for me to share my overall processing mindset and approach. (Plus, it might help others to understand why my images aren’t as “stunning” as the images of those who blend.)
In many ways I still consider myself a film shooter, albeit with an upgrade to a digital camera. Processing, though not my favorite part of photography, is an essential digital windfall that enables me to extract results from the photons I capture, results that were never possible with film (especially for those of us who shot only color film/transparencies). Like most digital photographers, I couldn’t succeed without processing—the alternative is to let the camera or computer make processing decisions, and that’s control I don’t want to relinquish. And given the challenges of minimal light photography, processing is doubly important for Milky Way images.
Given that I don’t blend images (for Milky Way photography that’s usually one exposure for the foreground and another for the sky), I start with a raw file that needs help. A lot of help. I like foreground detail in my night images, which requires me to compromise with a less than ideal f-stop, shutter speed, and (especially) ISO to gather enough light. And even with these compromises, the image straight from the camera is still far darker and noisier than ideal.
The right gear
First, even with all the skill and processing software you can muster, if you’re going to photograph the Milky Way with one click, you need to have the camera and lens to do it. On a moonless night light capture is king, which means using a camera able to return relatively clean results at extreme ISOs (up to 12,800) with a very fast, wide lens—24mm and f/2.8 is okay, but wider and faster is better.
For years my Milky Way body has been some version of the Sony a7S series (a7S, a7S II, a7S III)—most recently the Sony a7S III (a truly remarkable low light camera), while my night lens has been one of the following: Sony 24mm f/1.4 GM, Sony 20mm f/1.8 G, or Sony 14mm f/1.8 GM. But an equipment change may be afoot—details below.
Exposure compromise
My processing choices depend a lot on my exposure choices, which as I said earlier, are all compromises. For example, with my 14mm at f/1.8 wide open, I can usually keep the ISO in the 3200 to 6400, and my shutter speed to 15 seconds—quality compromises for sure (high ISO means high noise, longer shutter speeds mean star motion), but the results are certainly acceptable. It might help to know that when I photograph the Milky Way, I usually give each composition a variety of exposure settings and choice the best one later, when I can see the images on my computer.
It starts with noise reduction
For all of my images, my standard noise processing is Topaz DeNoise AI Photoshop plugin. I used to run my Milky Way images through DxO PhotoLab 2, but later versions of DeNoise have been so good that I now skip the DXO step.
In Topaz I magnify the view to 100% (and sometimes 200%) and play with the Noise Reduction and Recover Detail sliders until I’m confident I’ve found the combination that maximizes noise reduction without muddying the detail. I’ve had the most success with the Low Light, Standard, and Severe Noise panels (in that order), but your results may vary so experiment with all the options to find the panels that work for you.
The method behind my madness
Processing is where things start to get more vague because my approach is less an explicit series of steps than it is searching for the best way to achieve the results I want, steps that can vary a lot from image to image. Sometimes I can achieve most of what I want in Lightroom, other times I lean more heavily on Photoshop—usually it’s a fairly even balance of the two.
Given my hit-and-miss approach, it’s probably most important to explain what makes a successful Milky Way image. Here’s what I’m going for:
- Minimal noise: Asked and answered (Topaz DeNoise AI)
- The right sky color: As far as I’m concerned, the color of the sky in a Milky Way image the photographer’s creative choice because at night the human eye doesn’t capture enough light to discern color. If you look at my recent Milky Way images, you’ll see that I tend to avoid a blue/cyan sky in favor of something more blue/purple. It just feels more night-like to me. But that’s just my opinion and I empower you to go with whatever color makes you happy (more on that below). And lately I’ve been skewing away from blue and toward black with just a hint of blue—and no cyan.
- Foreground detail: The amount varies with the foreground, and how much light I can give it without too much noise.
- Uniform sky tone and hue (as much as possible): I don’t like a huge difference between the sky near the horizon and up toward the top of the frame
- The stars should pop: I want the sky to be fairly dark, but the stars to stand out.
- No part of the Milky Way should be blown out: While I want the stars bright, I don’t want them too bright.
- And the final result still needs to look like night (even though it will be brighter than the human eye sees).
I make extensive use of Lightroom and Photoshop’s History panels. There’s no single best way to do anything in Lightroom and Photoshop, so I make a lot of what-if?, trial-and-error adjustments that I only keep if I’m satisfied. So you’re not going to get specific steps from me as much as you’ll get things to try and accept/reject. The other thing I want to emphasize is to magnify the image to 100% (1:1) when you’re trying to decide whether or not to accept an adjustment.
I always play with the Highlights/Whites/Shadows/Blacks sliders—lots of up/down trial-and-error adjustments to find the right balance (gotta love that History panel). The Lightroom Clarity and Texture sliders will make the stars pop (and sometimes the foreground), but be especially gentle with these to avoid exaggerating the noise and making the stars look crispy). And Dehaze will add contrast to the sky that really enhances the Milky Way, but it also might darken parts of the scene too much. As with Clarity and Texture, Dehaze moderation is key.
I use lots of techniques to get the color I want—often just one or two adjustments are enough, and sometimes it requires a lot of adjustments. In Lightroom, I play with Color Temperature and Tint. That usually means cooling the temperature to somewhere in the 3000-4000 range, and nudging the Tint slider slightly to the right—less cyan, more red (which creates a blue with hints of purple). When those things don’t do the job, I’ll play with Lightroom’s HSL sliders. And now that Lightroom’s masking capability makes separating sky and foreground a snap, I usually process each independently of the other.
To tweak the color in Photoshop, I usually select the area I want to adjust, Feather it fairly loosely (large Feather Radius), and create a Color Balance and/or Saturation layer, doing lots of trial-and-error moves with each. And when using Saturation, I almost always work on specific colors, adjusting some combination of Hue, Saturation, and Lightness until I’m satisfied. Also, I find that some of the other adjustments I make in Lightroom and Photoshop tend to pump up the color too much, so I usually desaturate the sky a fair amount in Photoshop.
To make the Milky Way more prominent, a few passes with the Dodge brush set to Highlights can do wonders by brightening the stars without affecting the sky. But don’t overdo it—I prefer multiple passes at low Opacity (less than 20).
Probably the trickiest thing to contend with is a different hue near the horizon than I get in the rest of the sky. I can usually mitigate this somewhat with a feather selection and a Color Balance or Saturation layer, described above. And sometimes, if I’m really brave, I’ll select the offending area, Feather it, use the Eyedropper tool to pick the color I want, and the Paint Bucket tool to apply the color to the selected area. I usually get better results with Tolerance set fairly high (>50) and Opacity fairly low (<30). If you do this, don’t expect it to work every time, and always examine the results at 100% because it can introduce some pretty nasty blotchiness that doesn’t jump right out at you on first glance at lower magnification.
With most of my images, the last thing I do before saving is sharpen. But since night images are rarely about fine detail, and sharpening exacerbates noise and creates crispy-looking stars, I usually don’t sharpen my Milky Way images.
These tips are not intended to be the final word on Milky Way processing—I just wanted to give you some insight into my approach, both my goals and the steps I take to achieve them. I’ve been using Photoshop for a long time, but don’t consider myself a Photoshop expert, not even close. There may be (probably are) better ways to do many of these things. But I’ve always been a simple-first photographer: Do things the simplest possible way until you find some way that’s better, or until you encounter something you just can’t do without upping the complexity. And if you take nothing else away from this, I hope you at least feel empowered to experiment until you achieve results that make you happy.
About this image
Milky Way Reflection, Lake Wakatipu, New Zealand
New Zealand is hands down my favorite place to photograph the Milky Way. Better even than my previous favorite, the ultra-dark Colorado River at the bottom of the Grand Canyon, because: 1) the skies in New Zealand are almost as dark as the bottom of the Grand Canyon 2) the New Zealand air is usually cleaner (less dust and pollution) 3) New Zealand’s winter matches the Milky Way core’s prime months, so in June (when we do our workshop) the galactic center is photographable from about 7 p.m. until 7 a.m. 4) the Milky Way is higher in the sky down here.
Milky Way photography is a priority in the New Zealand workshop—not just for the people who sign up, but for Don and me as well. But since it’s winter, we often battle clouds, so the Milky Way on any given night is never a sure thing. To maximize our chances, over the years we’ve been doing this workshop Don and I have identified a handful of prime Milky Way locations at various points along the workshop’s 10-day journey.
A Milky Way location needs a good view of the sky in the direction of the Milky Way (in the first hours after sunset, that would be southeast), a compelling foreground, and minimal light pollution. It took us a couple of years, but we finally found a nice Milky Way spot on beautiful (and large) Lake Wakatipu near Queenstown. Since the workshop begins and ends in Queenstown, this spot allows us to check off the Milky Way box at the start of the trip (fingers crossed), and also gives us one last resort shot at it at the end of the trip.
This year we lucked out with clear skies on our very first night. So after a nice sunset farther up the lake toward Glenorchy, we drove back toward town and pulled into “our” spot. After waiting about 30 minutes for the sky to darken, we went to work. At first Don and I concentrated on getting everyone up to speed with Milky Way photography, but eventually we were able to get to work on a few images of our own.
On this New Zealand trip I’d decided to try my Sony a7R V at night—but because I’ve never tried this camera at night, to hedge my bets I also packed the trusty a7S III. The lens I chose for this trip was my Sony 14mm f/1.8 GM—almost as fast as the 24mm f/1.4, the Milky Way’s elevation in the New Zealand sky makes opting for the extra width of the 14mm a no brainer.
I started with the a7S III, but after a half dozen or so images switched to the a7R V. I haven’t looked at the a7S III images yet, but I have to say that I’m blown away by the results I got with my a7R V. Blown away enough that my days of packing a body just for night photography might very well be over. To get an image as clean as this one with 61 megapixel everyday camera truly is a (cliché warning) game changer.
I’ve photographed here several times before, each in slightly different conditions. This year the fact that there wasn’t as much snow on the peaks as previous years was more than compensated by the still, reflective lake surface.
We still have three more workshop nights, and I have cautious hopes for our planned Milky Way shoot at Tasman Lake in Mt. Cook / Aoraki National Park in a couple of nights. But if the clouds take us down, there’s no stress because we already have a great Milky Way shoot in the bank. Add that to our very special day cruising on Doubtful Sound, yesterday’s excellent Wanaka Tree shoot, and today’s spectacular Fox Glacier helicopter ride and hike, not to mention lots of fun with a bunch of great people, and I’m already declaring this trip an unforgettable success.
A Milky Way Gallery
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Creative Juices
Posted on September 4, 2022
Infinity, Lake Wanaka, New Zealand (June 2019)
Sony a7RIII
Sony 16-35 f/2.8 GM
30 seconds
F/8
ISO 100
One of my favorite summer treats is the smoothie I whip up for lunch on hot days. I grab whatever fruit is available, toss it in my Vitamix with a little macadamia milk and ice, and let it rip. Each smoothie tastes different, but it’s always delicious.
Why am I sharing food prep tips in a photo blog? Because I can think of no better analogy for the Sony Kando event I experienced this week in Sun Valley, Idaho. Though Kando is truly indescribable, I’ll attempt the impossible and explain that it’s Sony’s gift to the creative photographers and videographers who share their love for Sony products with the world (that’s my definition, not Sony’s). Each year Sony takes a couple hundred of these Creatives, tosses them together at Kando, mixes in a variety of creative, social, and educational opportunities (and food!), and presses Blend. The result is a concoction that’s distinctly different from anything that preceded it, but always delicious. Just like my smoothies.
Kando is a Japanese word without a perfect English equivalent, but as near as I can tell it is the feeling of intense pleasure and excitement that happens when we encounter something truly exceptional. I’ve attended each of the four in-person Kando gatherings—Kando 1.0, just north of Santa Barbara; 2.0 at Asilomar near Carmel; 3.0 in Bend, Oregon; and this year’s 4.0 in Sun Valley, Idaho—enough to know that the event is aptly named. There are fundamental similarities between each one: the multi-day structure, the positive energy, and it is populated by many of the same people (blended each year with a liberal sprinkling of new faces)—yet somehow each event feels different in its own stimulating way.
Creativity is always on display at Kando, but this year I think the creativity was on steroids. The mix of Sony Creatives, as always, included a cadre of established photographers/videographers with a massive body of work (many of whom you’d recognize by name, or if not by name, by their work), infused with a liberal dose of young social media “influencers” with 6- and 7-digit followers. Still-photography, video, and even audio were well represented.
Some of the Creatives taught classes or participated in panels discussing their creative process and insights, and everyone shared by example. We were all encouraged to shoot and share throughout the week, with opportunities ranging from models, action, elaborate sets, and field trips available both day and night. At any given instant, it seemed half the Creatives would be creating, and the other half was watching. And I can’t begin to express how much fun it is to watch creative people do their thing.
For me Kando’s greatest lesson is the reminder that creative opportunities are infinite, and we’re limited only by our ability to see them. To say I was in awe of the creativity surrounding me would be an understatement. But I don’t think there was a single person present who wasn’t in awe of the creativity surrounding all of us.
So, fresh off my Kando week with my creative juices still flowing, I’m reaching into the archives for and image from one of my most memorable shoots in recent years. I chose this image for several reasons: in the context of creativity, there’s my recent post about finding unique takes on this solitary tree; then there’s my recent post about fog; and (especially) because a couple of weeks ago I discovered that, for some reason I’m unable to explain, and despite having shared this image many times since its capture in 2019, I’ve never written about it or the shoot—a blatant violation of my personal rule to never share an image without writing something on its capture and/or inspiration.
And in the spirit of full disclosure, my original Wanaka Tree Fog image had some minor flaws that (though not necessarily visible to anyone else) always bugged me, so I reprocessed it. And when I went back to the original raw file, I found another frame captured just a minute or so later that was compositionally very similar, but just a little cleaner to my eye.
Red Sunset, Lake Wanaka, New Zealand
This was the first of two New Zealand winter workshops Don Smith and I did in June 2019. The prior evening our group had enjoyed what was probably the best sunset we’ve ever had in New Zealand. We went to bed basking in the glory of that shoot, and woke to dense fog that obscured everything beyond 100 yards.
Since this was a sunrise, and the tree was easy walking distance from our hotel, we’d instructed the group to meet us out there 40 minutes before sunrise. Walking out in the dark, Don and I ran into one workshop participant who told us it was too foggy and he was going back to bed. We tried to convince him that the fog created a spectacular opportunity for something unique, but his mind was made up. At the tree, a couple of others in the group were already shooting, and a few more joined us soon, but I can’t remember whether anyone else was turned away by the fog.
Despite the darkness, it was obvious that something special was happening and I started shooting as soon as I could get set up. To give you an idea of how dark it was when we started, today’s image is a 30-second exposure at f/8 and ISO 100.
As special as the scene was, given its static nature, my biggest concern was finding a sufficient variety of unique takes. The conditions pretty much wiped out the go-to creative tools I use to vary a composition: the air and water was completely still, removing motion as a tool; the lack of any background and my distance from the tree eliminated any depth-of-field opportunities; though the morning brightened slowly, the light was completely uniform and shadowless; and the fog completely obliterated the visibility beyond 100 yards, so it did little good to move around to juxtapose the tree against different backgrounds.
Looking the images in Lightroom’s grid view, I count 38 frames over a 40 minute span this morning. And while I have very little specific memory of most of them, just looking at this history I can see what my mindset was.
The first two frames I captured in rapid fire (well, as rapid as 30-second exposures can be) the instant I hit the lakeshore. I remember being so excited by what was in front of me, I just shot to make sure I had something in case the fog lifted.
The next set of frames, and the bulk of my images from this morning, started about 3 minutes later. I know after comparing the tree in the two sets, that I realized the angle at the first spot was poor and the tree was noticeably compressed. To fix this, I moved along the lakeshore until I had the best possible angle on the tree’s distinctive low, sweeping branch (now gone).
Once I was here and confident that I’d captured something nice, I slowed down and started really working the scene. Each of the 36 images I captured after moving into the better position was distinct from the rest of the images (no duplicates). Of this 36, 20 were horizontal and 16 were vertical. I also varied my focal length and framing, sometimes going wider, other times tighter.
In nearly every frame, the tree is centered on the horizontal axis, and sometimes on the vertical axis too (smack-dab in the middle of the frame). This was because there wasn’t really anything to balance the frame horizontally if I put the tree off-center. But just to cover myself, toward the end I did take a couple of horizontal frames with the tree left and right of center.
I had the most fun playing with my polarizer, emphasizing the reflection in some frames, and revealing the submerged foreground rocks in others. As you can see, I went with one with the rocks visible, but revisiting the images now, I can see others I’d like to process, including one that’s all reflection and no rocks.
Circling back to Kando and this whole creativity thing, I feel like my creativity pales in comparison to some of what I saw last week. But I also know that my own creative process that I tried to share a small part of here, is very personal, and that it serves my objective to share Nature’s beauty and (I hope) inspire others to appreciate Nature as much as I do. But whatever gets your creative juices flowing, I can tell you absolutely that being around other creative people is good for the soul and a great place to start.
The Shot Less Taken
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Watch Out For That Tree
Posted on July 24, 2022
Reflection on the Rocks, Wanaka Willow Tree, New Zealand
Sony a7RIV
Sony 12-24 f/4 G
1/5 second
F/11
ISO 100
I’m incredibly blessed to make my living guiding enthusiastic photographers to many of our planet’s most beautiful locations. While this makes my life far too rich for complaint, let me say (without complaining) that a particular challenge imposed by frequent return visits to the same locations is finding unique ways to photograph them.
My usual go-to approach at these familiar locations is to play with the scene’s “creative triad,” using the exposure variables manage my images’ motion, light, and depth. Whether it’s blurring or freezing water, going for silhouettes or high key, or choosing depth-of-field from narrow to extreme, I love love playing with these variables to create something unique. But some scenes don’t even offer a lot of those opportunities.
Never is that more clear than when I visit the solitary willow tree near the south shore of Lake Wanaka in New Zealand. This striking tree just stands by itself in a lake (most of the time), with little motion, silhouette, or depth of field options to play with.
Nevertheless, each time I visit Wanaka, I challenge myself to find a version of the scene that’s different from anything I’ve captured. And just because I don’t have my full arsenal of creativity weapons doesn’t mean I’ve arrived completely disarmed.
Without the creative triad, my creativity relies largely on some combination of conditions, juxtaposition, and focal length. As you can see in the gallery below, the conditions at the time of my visit play a huge role in my creative choices. Weather conditions for sure, but also things like the quality of the reflection, the light, and whether it’s day or night.
Because a picture is worth a thousand words, I’ll spare you long explanations and share some examples with just a few words of explanation
Wanaka Reflection, New Zealand
New Zealand’s winter clouds are a frequent source of delight. This image was captured late-morning (not usually great light), but the clouds and reflection were so nice that I couldn’t resist shooting. I chose a horizontal composition because it allowed me to include more clouds reflection, while filling the frame top-to-bottom with the tree and its reflection, than a vertical would.
Red Sunset, Lake Wanaka, New Zealand
Juxtaposition is almost always a prime consideration. I especially love the snow-capped Southern Alps, so all things equal, I’ll usually position myself so they’re in the background. In this scene the reflection was slightly disturbed by gentle undulations on the lake’s surface, so I added a 6-stop neutral density filter to smooth the water. The resulting 30-second exposure also softened the fast moving clouds—a bonus.
Gray Dawn, Lake Wanaka, New Zealand
But it’s not always about background juxtaposition. For example, one morning the fog was so thick, the background was completely irrelevant, so I chose a spot that best emphasized the tree’s shape and allowed me to fill my foreground with a mosaic of barely submerged stones.
One of the conditions I have at least partial control over is stars. By going out after dark on a clear night, I can include stars. And depending on the timing, I can juxtapose the tree with the Milky Way. Because these images were captured at different times of the night, including the Milky Way resulted in completely different backgrounds. The first image came a few hours after sunset, when the Milky Way hung above the amber lights of Wanaka; the second image came on a different night, a couple of hours before sunrise, when the Milky Way had rotated above the Southern Alps.
Lone Willow Reflection, Lake Wanaka, New Zealand
I wasn’t really crazy about the sky when I captured this image, but I liked the background peaks and low-hanging clouds. So I retreated down the lakeshore, away from the tree, and then climbed a gentle slope to distance myself even further, then used a telephoto to enlarge the tree and shrink the distance between it and the mountains and clouds.
Reflection on the Rocks, Wanaka Willow Tree, New Zealand
This image is the product of a last minute change to the sunset plan in this year’s New Zealand workshop that I do with Don Smith. We had a feeling something special might happen at Lake Wanaka, and wanted make sure we had the group in the best possible spot in case it did. Read more about this evening in my June 28 blog post.The beautiful clouds that had started the evening over the Southern Alps were quickly moving southeast and out of my frame. My options were to hold my position and photograph the tree with the mountains and no clouds, or reposition myself to feature the best of the clouds against the town of Wanaka. I went with the clouds.
Because I saw the potential for a beautiful sky, I went went wide to maximize the sky, choosing my Sony 12-24 f/2.8 GM lens on my Sony a7RIV body. I positioned myself so the reflection mirrored the arc of retreating clouds, creating a frame for the tree. I was aware that I was picking up the homes and buildings lining the opposite lakeshore, but felt that was justifiable compromise to ensure the best clouds and sunset color potential.
The light was beautiful when I started, but it just kept improving as the color ramped up. Every few minutes I repositioned myself to keep the tree framed by the shifting clouds. Wanting to feature the flat, multi-toned rocks visible beneath a thin veneer of still water, I dropped my tripod and moved it a foot or so into the water. And finally, I shifted just enough for the trunk to split the gap between two distant peaks. Going vertical allowed me to get the full arc of clouds and their reflection above the rocks, with less far lakeshore than a horizontal composition would have.
This image required very little processing, but I did burn the far lakeshore a little to deemphasize the buildings there.
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Variations on a Tree
Looking Up Down Under
Posted on July 17, 2022
Milky Way and Small Magellanic Cloud, Lake Wakatipu, New Zealand
Sony a7SIII
Sony 14mm f/1.8 GM
ISO 1600
f/1.8
20 seconds
James Webb Space Telescope’s First Deep Field image
Are you as thrilled as I am by the mesmerizing images we’re seeing from the James Webb Space Telescope? There’s nothing like a heaping dose of perspective to remind humans of our insignificance in the grand scheme things, and these images deliver perspective in spades.
I think my favorite Webb image is the view deep into a seemingly tiny black region of sky that reveals thousands of galaxies. How tiny? According to the NASA website, “This slice of the vast universe covers a patch of sky approximately the size of a grain of sand held at arm’s length by someone on the ground.”) The light from these galaxies traveled as far as 13.1 billion years to reach us, which means we’re getting a view of our nascent Universe as it was less than a billion years after the Big Bang.
I get another dose of perspective, albeit on a much smaller scale, each time I visit the Southern Hemisphere. After a lifetime living north of the equator, I pretty much take for granted the Northern Hemisphere night sky. When I’m outside after dark, I reflexively look up and locate the Big Dipper. Using the Dipper’s pointer stars, my eyes slide to Polaris (the North Star) to locate north, then slowly scan the surrounding sky for other familiar features: bright stars Arcturus and Spica, constellations Cassiopeia and Corona Borealis, among many. If it’s dark enough, I try to pick out the Little Dipper and the Andromeda Galaxy.
Looking up at night in the Southern Hemisphere is downright disorienting. Most of the stars and constellations are completely unfamiliar (but no less beautiful), and those that are familiar (like Orion), appear “upside down.” (There’s no true up and down in space because up/down, left/right is always relative to the viewer’s frame of reference.) The Milky Way down here is reversed, and I’ll never forget the first time I watched a Southern Hemisphere moonrise and realized that it moved left (north) as it rose—duh.
A personal Southern Hemisphere highlight is the opportunity to see the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds. Like the first (only) time I saw the Taj Mahal and Stonehenge, my first view of the Magellanic Clouds was like spotting a celebrity I’d heard about my entire life but never imagined I’d see in person.
The Magellanic Clouds are satellite galaxies of our Milky Way. The Large Magellanic Cloud is about 160 light years from Earth and estimated to contain 30 billion or so stars; the Small Magellanic Cloud is about 200 light years distant and weighs in at around 3 billion stars. It also appears the the SMC orbits the LMC, making it a satellite of a satellite.
In a dark Southern Hemisphere sky, both Magellanic Clouds appear as smudges of light, faint but clearly visible. The diameter of the LMC is about 5 degrees, while the SMC spans less than 2 degrees (for reference, the Sun and Moon are each about 1/2 degree across when viewed from Earth). None of Magellanic Clouds’ individual stars are bright enough to be resolved with the human eye.
About this image
In an earlier post I detailed the night I photographed the Milky Way over Cecil Peak and Lake Wakatipu. It was the first night of the New Zealand winter photo workshop Don Smith and I do each year, and we were pretty pleased that the conditions cooperated so nicely.
We came straight here from our sunset shoot, then waited for the sky to darken enough for the Milky Way to appear. Toward the end of the shoot, once everyone was locked in and feeling good about their results, I started to look for ways to do something a little different and my eyes landed on the Magellanic Clouds. But there were a couple of problems: first, there’s a lot of sky between them and the Milky Way, which was still going to be my primary subject; second, they were both above a blob of large shrubs (or small trees) on the lakeshore.
It’s times like this that I especially love the wide field of view of my Sony 14 f/1.8 GM lens. This lens is always great in New Zealand because the Milky Way’s core here is so high in the sky, the wide field of view enables me to get lots of Milky Way and foreground. This evening I found that by going horizontal at 14mm, I could in fact get the Milky Way and Small Magellanic Cloud in my frame without crowding either too close to the border.
But now the ugly shrubs were in my frame too. The solution for that problem was simply to walk about 50 yards up the lake. Engaging the Bright Monitoring feature on my Sony a7SIII (Sony shooters need to look up this underused feature that’s fantastic for night photography—mine’s assigned to a custom button on all of my bodies), I saw in my viewfinder that the shrubs were no longer a problem.
I only shot here for about 5 minutes, but by the time I made it back to the group, the group was ready to head back to the hotel for dinner—always a good sign that everyone was happy with their results.
Here’s my Photo Tips article on Milky Way photography
New Zealand Photo Workshops
Looking Up
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Unexpected Rewards
Posted on July 10, 2022
Clearing Storm, Hooker River, New Zealand
Sony a7RIV
Sony 12-24 f/4 G
1/4 second
F/16
ISO 100
One summer when I was a kid, my family took a camping vacation to the Canadian Rockies. Bits and pieces of that trip return to me as vague memories, but one memory permanently etched in my brain is the color of Lake Louise and Moraine Lake. My dad, a very passionate amateur photographer, was frothing with excitement and must have exhausted half his film budget (remember those days?) at Moraine Lake alone. Nevertheless, and despite my dad’s pictures, I couldn’t fully process a world where water could be that color, and for many years after that doubted my memory.
Long before visiting New Zealand I accepted that water really can be that color, but still had few opportunities to view it. Then I started visiting New Zealand, where photographing the lakes and rivers gives me a little déjà vu—it’s just plain disorienting to see water this color.
So what’s going on?
In areas of persistent cold, snow often accumulates faster than it melts. Over many years of accumulating, the snow’s weight compresses it into ice and a glacier is born. A glacier is incredibly heavy; since pressure decreases the freezing point of ice, at the interface between the glacier and the underlying rock (where the pressure of the ice’s weight is greatest), melting ice lubricates the glacier and allows it to move downhill. The glacier’s extreme weight, combined with this forward motion, breaks up the rock. Embedded with rock fragments, the glacier behaves like sandpaper, grinding the rock on which it slides into finer and finer particles. The finest of these particles is called “glacial flour.”
Meltwater from the glacier flows downhill, carrying scoured rock with it. While the larger rock particles simply sink, the glacial flour remains suspended in the runoff. While most of the sunlight striking water infused with glacial flour is absorbed by the suspended particles, the green and blue wavelengths aren’t absorbed; instead they scatter back to our eyes and we are treated to turquoise water. The water’s exact hue (whether it appears more green or blue) is determined by the size of the suspended particles, which dictates the relative amount of green and blue wavelengths they scatter.
About this image
After losing two years to COVID, Don Smith and I were thrilled to resume our annual New Zealand winter photo workshop last month. I’ve been home for about a week now and despite (surprisingly mild) jet lag, am slowly making my way through my images. We had so many special moments that it’s hard to decide which one to process next—but I’m not complaining. I chose this one because it stands out as one of the trip’s most unexpected treats.
Our last stop before returning to Queenstown was Twizel, a tiny town near Aoraki / Mt. Cook National Park. A couple of days earlier we’d rushed here from Te Anau, hoping to make it up to Tasman Lake ahead of a storm. Our effort was rewarded with a nice Tasman Lake sunset shoot, and though the storm did come in overnight as promised, we even managed to squeeze in a beautiful sunrise at nearby Lake Pukaki before the sky completely opened up.
The rest of that day was wet and gray. Despite the nasty weather, we drove back up to the park that afternoon, but eventually turned around because the farther we drove, the harder it rained. And since we’d logged a lot of miles in the last 9 days, the group didn’t seem mind a little break. Instead of taking pictures, we spend a couple of nice hours sharing images by the fire.
Based on the rain and forecast, on the morning we were to leave for Queenstown we had no reason to expect any quality photography. But we’re photographers, and this was our final full day in what is arguably the most beautiful country in the world, so we headed back up to the national park with no plan except to see what we could find. For the entire 45 minute drive the gray ceiling hid the mountains and showed no sign of lifting. We decided to head for the bridge over the Hooker River and see what happened.
We decided to hang out near the bridge over the Hooker River, and weren’t there long before the clouds started to brighten. Soon patches of blue appeared overhead. A few minutes later rapidly thinning clouds draped Mt. Blackburn and the surrounding peaks, catching the warm rays of the morning sun to create a clearing storm experience that rivaled anything I’ve seen in Yosemite.
We had about 45 minutes of great photography before more clouds smothered the peaks. I photographed from both sides of the river, but my favorite position was in the middle of bridge. This narrow, one-lane bridge had a pedestrian walkway, but it was on the upstream side—to get this shot I had to stand on the bridge with one eye on the scene and the other on the road. At one point a bus approached and I vaulted the rail onto the pedestrian walk, then waited while the bus squeeze by with about 6 inches room on each side.
That morning was a great reminder to each of us that the best photography often happens when you least expect it. We had no reason to believe conditions would improve, but we went out anyway. Many times the conditions never improve and we’re disappointed—as we had been the previous afternoon—but these times when Nature surprises is a more than ample reward for all the prior disappointment.
Unexpected Rewards
(Beautiful moments I had no reason to expect)
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Before and After
Posted on June 28, 2022
Reflection, Lake Wanaka Willow Tree, New Zealand
Sony 𝛂1
Sony 24-105 G
1/20 second
F/11
ISO 100
I’m sitting in the Queenstown, New Zealand airport waiting to board the first of four flights that will total 26 hours and land me a mere 2-hour drive from home. While I’m still coherent, I’ll attempt to whip out this week’s (slightly late) blog post, using low hanging fruit from the just-completed New Zealand workshop: The always beautiful Wanaka Willow Tree.
Each year (that we’re not thwarted by a global pandemic) Don Smith and I guide one or two groups of photographers to our favorite locations on New Zealand’s indescribable South Island. In a land brimming with highlights, right near the top of this workshop’s highlights is our visit to the lone willow tree in Lake Wanaka.
The Wanaka Willow is arguably the most photographed tree in the world. Rising in solitary splendor from the glassy surface of Lake Wanaka, further enhanced by a backdrop of snow-capped peaks, the graceful outline of this arboreal icon has pleased visitors for decades. With free public parking just 100 yards away (or a five minute stroll from the workshop hotel), the tree’s effortless access makes it easy for all to enjoy.
I first photographed the tree in 2017, and have returned maybe a dozen times since—sunrise and sunset, day and night. In addition to the wonderful photography, on each visit I’m struck by the pleasure viewing it brings to everyone present. Whether they came to photograph, meditate, or simply gaze, each visitor is soothed by its presence, and seems infused with an infectious, positive spirit.
So, right at the start of the pandemic, to say I was mortified to learn that someone had vandalized this glorious tree would be an understatement. Visitors that morning in March 2020 were shocked to discover that overnight someone had taken a saw to several of the branches, including the graceful bottom branch that dipped toward the water before arcing skyward. I won’t even try to comprehend what would motivate someone to damage this source of so much joy for so many people, but it’s disturbing to know that we share the same planet.
Given all this, I was somewhat apprehensive about my first post-pandemic visit to the Wanaka Willow. Had it been ruined? Will we be forced to strike Wanaka from our New Zealand workshop destinations?
After photographing it twice on this month’s trip, I’m happy to declare that, while the Wanaka Willow may be (metaphorically) down, it’s far from out. Despite its scars, this solitary survivor has maintained its essence, and the joy remains. This year’s experience showed me that the Wanaka Willow’s appeal is so much more than its distinctive outline, and given its sublime setting, the new version has a chance to establish a new distinctive (albeit somewhat less graceful) outline.
The Wanaka Willow Before and After
Every time Don and I take a group to Wanaka, we like to give them a preview of the tree so their first exposure to it isn’t in the dark, at the start of the sunrise shoot. This year we checked that box with a lunch stop as we passed through town on our way to Fox Glacier.
Returning to Wanaka a couple of days later, the original plan called for a sunset shoot elsewhere on the lake, followed by a sunrise shoot at the tree. But with a forecast that included a chance of rain the next morning, we decided the tree shoot in particular is too important to risk and offered to split the group so anyone who wanted to go to the other spot could. Fortunately, the vote was unanimous to stay at the tree.
I love it when things work out and I look a lot smarter than I am. That evening’s sunset delivered beautiful pink clouds reflecting on a mirror surface. I captured this image toward the end of the sunset, after most of the clouds had moved on. As I was about to pack up, I spied one remaining cloud fragment reflecting in the lake and ran down to a spot where I could juxtapose it with the tree. While the earlier brilliant pink had softened to muted pastels, I thought the subdued tones enhanced the moment and perfectly reflected the quiet peace I felt.
More Trees
Resolution Revelation
Posted on February 7, 2021
Winter Sunset, Wanaka Willow Tree, New Zealand
Sony a7RIII
Sony 24-105 G
30 seconds
F/9
ISO 200
For years I’ve been pleading with camera manufacturers to stop giving us more resolution, and instead concentrate on things like improving dynamic range and high ISO performance. And while I still think that would be a better approach, I have to admit that I’m loving having all these pixels to play with.
Red Sunset, Lake Wanaka, New Zealand
The catalyst for my resolution revelation was this New Zealand sunset image. A couple of months ago I decided that I wanted to hang a large, vertical print in a space on a wall in my office. I really like this image, but it wasn’t vertical, and the vertical versions I captured that evening weren’t during peak color. In the olden days I’d have just moved on to a different image, but advancing sensor technology has caused me to rethink my position on the resolution race.
Let’s review
In digital photography, light passing through a lens is focused onto a sensor packed with an array of microscopic electronic light-catchers called “photosites.” Each photosite reports information about the incoming photons to the camera’s microprocessor, which interprets the light’s color and intensity at that location on the sensor. That information is digitized and stored with the information from all the other photosites. Voila, a digital image is born.
Digging deeper, we see that not all photosites are created equal, and that (on most sensors, depending on the technology) each photosite measures a specific color, either red, green, or blue. But for simplicity sake, it’s enough to know that one photosite equals one pixel—that is, a 42 megapixel camera has 42 million photosites, and a 50 megapixel camera has 50 million photosites, and so on.
Any digital camera, whether it be a smartphone, a full-frame 35mm mirrorless camera, or whatever, has a fixed amount of sensor real estate upon which to place its photosites. Fortunately, as sensor technology evolves, not only are we getting more photosites, the image quality is improving with it.
But improving sensors can’t change the fact that a larger photosite collects more light than a smaller one, making it more efficient. Think of a bucket: the bigger the bucket, the more water it holds before overflowing. Another undeniable truth is, the farther apart the photosites are, the less each photosite interferes with its neighbors, and the cooler they remain (heat is the enemy of pretty much all things electronic). And while they could solve these problems by just making the sensors bigger whenever they increase the resolution, larger sensors would require different lenses. So there are really only two practical ways to increase a sensor’s resolution: shrink its photosites, and/or cram the photosites closer.
For any given sensor technology, the fewer the photosites (lower megapixel number), the better the image quality. We can define image quality in a number of ways, but as a landscape photographer, the two quality factors that matter most to me are dynamic range (the range of light a sensor can “see,” from the darkest shadows to the brightest highlights) and high ISO capability (light sensitivity). That’s why I’ve always hoped that camera manufacturers would stop adding resolution and instead concentrate on dynamic range and sensitivity.
A little history
My first DSLR camera was 6 megapixels, and I was happy. But as sensor technology improved, cameras were able to add photosites without sacrificing image quality, and I was happier. At around 24 megapixels I reached the point where I was pretty convinced I didn’t need any more resolution, and would gladly sacrifice more resolution to get even more quality.
But the manufactures kept going. When I got the Sony a7RIII that I used to capture this New Zealand winter scene, I though surely its 42 megapixel sensor would be the end of the resolution road. Silly me.
Back to the present
Today, not only does my 61 megapixel Sony a7RIV have more resolution than I ever dared dream would be possible, all that resolution has come without sacrificing my coveted dynamic range and high ISO performance. And lately, I’ve actually started to appreciate having resolution horsepower to spare.
First, I’ve come to realize that for the vast majority of scenes I shoot, my Sony Alpha bodies have more than enough dynamic range—so much that I virtually never use the graduated neutral density filters that I once considered essential for managing extreme dynamic range. And for those rare times I need to test my camera’s ISO limits, I have my 12 megapixel Sony a7SIII (12MP sounds small compared to most of today’s sensors, but it’s more than adequate for most uses), that seems to be able to see in the dark. In other words, I rarely find myself longing for more performance.
And more and more, I find myself appreciating the extra resolution. Of course it’s important to get the framing right at capture, but sometimes that’s not possible. For example, when I photograph lightning, the best I can do is loosely frame a nice composition to ensure that I get the lightning somewhere in the frame. At 50 megapixels, I have plenty of resolution to crop in tighter on the bolt, wherever in my frame it fired. Also, a magazine will ask if I have a vertical version of a horizontal image to put on their cover. 50 megapixels is more than big enough to crop a vertical version from the original file, confident that I’ll still have plenty of resolution for even the highest quality publication.
How much resolution? Reversing the original 2/3 crop of my Sony 61 megapixel Sony a7RIV, gives me nearly 27 megapixels. And even my Sony a7RIII, with its “measly” 42 megapixels gives a nearly 19 megapixel file when I crop a horizontal to a vertical (or vice versa).
So when I wanted a vertical print for my office, I didn’t hesitate open the horizontal original of my New Zealand sunset and find a vertical crop that I liked. I ended up going with a 24×36 print of the vertical (taken from the horizontal original) you see at the top of this blog post. And you know what? It looks marvelous.
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Cropped from the Original
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New Zealand Sunset
Posted on October 4, 2020
Sony a7RIII
Sony 24-105 G
30 seconds
F/9
ISO 200
This morning, while going through unprocessed images looking for something to blog about, I came across this image from last June in New Zealand. I realize the world probably doesn’t need any more pictures of this tree (which is why I’d never processed it), but after nearly two months of smoky skies that have robbed California of anything close to a normal sunset, sunrise/sunset color seemed to be a worthy topic, and this image definitely got my juices flowing.
Following a morning that had started with a beautiful sunrise reflection at Mirror Lakes in Milford Sound National Park, Don Smith and I (well, technically it was our driver) pulled the van carrying our New Zealand workshop group into Wanaka a couple of hours before sunset. We had a sunset spot in mind, but with a little time to spare we decided to give the group a quick preview of our sunrise subject, the iconic lone willow tree of Lake Wanaka. We never left.
It was pretty apparent from the instant of our arrival that the ingredients for a spectacular sunset were in place: clouds, clean air, and a clear spot on the western horizon to let sunlight through. Of course nothing in nature is guaranteed, but based on what we saw, Don and I made a calculated decision to alter our plan. Even though our original sunset spot would benefit from the same conditions, we decided that, because the opportunity to photograph this tree was one of the prime reasons most of the group signed up for the workshop in the first place, and sunrise conditions are never a sure thing, staying would give our group the best opportunity for a memorable experience here. Boy did we make the right call.
For this image I used my Breakthrough 6-stop neutral-density polarizer (X4 Dark CPL) to smooth a slight chop rippling the lake. Not only did the resulting 30-second exposure soften the lake surface, it added an ethereal blur to the distant clouds and fog.
Epiloge
Sunrise was in fact completely washed out by fog, but that didn’t mean it was a failure, just different….
Join Don Smith and me in our next New Zealand photo workshop
And speaking of sunrise/sunset color, I’ve revised my Photo Tips article on that very topic and added it below. So if you want to know why the sky is blue and sunsets are red, read on.
Sunset Color
A sunset myth
If your goal is a colorful sunset/sunrise and you have to choose between pristine or hazy air, which would you choose? If you said clean air, you’re in the minority. You’re also right. Despite some pretty obvious evidence to the contrary, it seems that the myth that a colorful sunset requires lots of particles in the air persists. But if particles in the air were necessary for sunset color, Los Angeles would be known for its vivid sunsets and Hawaii’s main claim to fame would be its beaches. (Okay, and maybe its luaus. And waterfalls. And pineapples. And Mai Tais. And…. Well, maybe lots of great stuff, but not its sunsets.)
So what is the secret to a great sunset? Granted, a cool breeze, warm surf, and a Mai Tai are a good start, but I’m thinking more photographically than recreationally. I look for a mix of clouds (to catch the color) with an opening for the sun to pass through and light the clouds. But even with a nice mix of clouds and sky, sometimes the color fizzles. Often the missing ingredient, contrary to common belief, is clean air—the cleaner the better.
Light and color
Understanding sunset color starts with understanding how sunlight and the atmosphere interact to color the sky. Visible light reaches our eyes in waves of varying length. The color we perceive is a function of wavelength, ranging from short to long: violet, indigo, blue, green, yellow, orange, and red. (These color names are arbitrary labels we’ve assigned to the colors we perceive at various wavelength points along the visible portion of the electromagnetic spectrum—there are an infinite number of wavelength-depenedent colors between each of these colors.)
Because a beam of sunlight passing in a vacuum (such as space) moves in a straight line (we won’t get into relativity and the effect of gravity on a beam of light), all its wavelengths reach our eyes simultaneously and we perceive the light as white. When a beam of sunlight encounters something (like Earth’s atmosphere), its light can be absorbed or scattered, depending on the wavelength and the properties of the interfering medium, and we see as color the remaining wavelength that reach our eyes.
For example, when sunlight strikes a leaf, all of its wavelengths except those that we perceive as green are absorbed, while the green wavelengths bounce to our eyes.
Color my world
Since our atmosphere is not a vacuum, sunlight is changed simply by passing through it. In an atmosphere without impurities (such as smoke and dust), light interacts only with air molecules. Air molecules are so small that they scatter only a very narrow range of wavelengths. This atmospheric scattering acts like a filter that scatters the violet and blue wavelengths first, allowing the longer wavelengths to pass through. When our sunlight has traveled through a relatively small amount of atmosphere (as it does when the sun is overhead), the wavelengths that reach our eyes are the just-scattered violet and blue wavelengths, and our sky looks blue (the sky appears more blue than violet because our eyes are more sensitive to blue light).
On the other hand, because the longer orange and red wavelengths are less easily scattered, they travel a much greater distance through the atmosphere. When the sun is on the horizon, its light has passed through much more atmosphere than it did when it was directly overhead, so the only light reaching our eyes at sunrise or sunset has been stripped of its shorter (blue and violet) wavelengths by its lengthy journey, leaving only the longer, orange and red wavelengths to color our sky. Sunset! (Or sunrise.)
Pollution dampens the filtering process. Rather than only scattering specific colors, light that encounters a molecule larger than its wavelength is more completely scattered—in other words, instead of scattering only the blue and violet wavelengths, polluted air catches some orange and reds too. Anyone who has blended a smoothie consisting of a variety of brightly colored ingredients (such as strawberries, blueberries, cantaloupe, and kale—uhh, yum?) knows the smoothie’s color won’t be nearly as vivid as any of its ingredients, not even close. Instead you’ll end up with a brownish or grayish muck that might at best be slightly tinted with the color of the predominant ingredient. Midday light that interacts with large particles in the atmosphere is similarly muddied, while polluted sunrise and sunset light has already had much of its red stripped out.
Verify this for yourself the next time a storm clears as the sun sets, and compare the color you see to the color on a hazy, summer evening in the city.
Tips for maximizing sunset color in a photograph
Any time rain has cleared the atmosphere and the remaining clouds are mixed with sunlight, there’s a good chance for vivid sunrise or sunset color. I have a few go-to locations near home, and at my frequently visited photo locations (Yosemite, Grand Canyon, Death Valley, Hawaii, and so on) that I beeline to when there’s a chance for color in the sky.
When I’m on location and preparing my shot before the sunset show begins, I look for clouds receiving direct sunlight. This is the light that will most likely color up at sunset, starting with an amber glow that transitions to pink, red, and eventually a deep orange.
An often overlooked color opportunity when the air is clean is the horizon opposite the sun after sunset or before sunrise. When the sun is below the horizon, the opposite horizon reveals the transition between the blues of night and the pinks of the sun’s first or last rays the best color of the day. This is especially true when there are no clouds in the direction of the sun. Photographing this twilight color with your back to the sun’s horizon has the added advantage of being much less contrasty and easier to manage with a camera.
Maximizing sunset color in your images requires careful exposure and composition decisions. By far the most frequent problem is overexposure—giving the scene more light than necessary. In scenes of such extreme contrast, your camera can’t capture the entire range of light your eyes see. And of course your camera has no idea what you’re photographing, so if you leave the exposure decision up to automatic metering, you’ll likely end up with a compromise exposure that tries to pull detail out of the shadows at the expense of color in the sky.
Since it’s the color you’re most interested in capturing, it’s usually best to spare the color in the highlights and let your shadows darken. This usually requires some planning—finding striking finding foreground subjects that stand out against the brighter sky, or water to reflect the sky’s color.
When you’ve found your sunset subject and are ready to shoot, base your exposure decisions on your camera’s histogram, not the way the picture looks on the LCD (never a reliable gauge of actual exposure). Remember, since your camera can’t capture what your eyes see anyway, the amount of light you give your scene is a creative decision. After you’ve exposed, make sure you check your RGB histogram to ensure that you haven’t clipped one of your color channels (most likely the red channel).
You can read more about metering in my Manual Exposure article.
For example: Sentinel Dome, Yosemite
Sunset Storm, Half Dome from Sentinel Dome, Yosemite
Sentinel Dome in Yosemite provides a 360 degree view of Yosemite and surrounding Sierra peaks. Among the many reasons it’s such a great sunset spot is that from atop Sentinel Dome you can see what’s happening on the western horizon and plan your shoot long before sunset arrives. On this summer evening I was up there shortly after an afternoon rain shower. Though air was crystal clear, lots of clouds remained—and there was an opening on the western horizon for the sun to slip through just before disappearing for the night.
Rather than settle for a more standard Half Dome composition, I wandered around a bit in search of an interesting foreground. I ended up targeting this group of dead pines on Sentinel’s northeast slope, a couple of hundred feet down from the summit. It was no coincidence that sunset that night, one of the most vivid I’ve ever seen, came shortly after a storm had cleansed the atmosphere. Not only did the clouds fire up, the color was so intense that its reflection colored the granite, trees, and pretty much every other exposed surface.
For example: Hilltop Oaks, Sierra Foothills
Oaks on Fire, Sierra Foothills, California
I was driving the Sierra foothills east of Sacramento looking for the right subject to put with this fiery sunset. Earlier in the sunset it had simply been a been a matter of finding a photogenic tree (or trees), but with the sun more than 15 minutes below the horizon, the foreground was so dark I needed a subject to silhouette against the sky—anything else would have been lost in the rapidly blackening shadows. These trees showed up just in the nick of time.
Color like this comes late (or, at sunrise, early), in the direction of the sun long after most people have gone to dinner (or while they’re still in bed). Everything in this scene that’s not sky is black, which is why my subject needed to stand out against the sky. I was so happy with my discovery that these trees have become go-to subjects for me—browse my galleries and count how many times you see one or both of them (often with a crescent moon).
For example: South Tufa, Mono Lake
Before the Sun, South Tufa, Mono Lake
The air on Sierra’s east side is much cleaner than air on the more populated west side, and the clouds formed as the prevailing westerly wind descends the Sierra’s precipitous east side are both unique and dramatic. Mono Lake makes a particularly nice subject for the Eastern Sierra’s brilliant sunrise/sunset shows. Not only does it benefit from the clean air and photogenic clouds, Mono Lake’s tufa formations and often glassy surface make a wonderful foreground. The openness of the terrain surrounding Mono Lake allows you to watch the entire sunrise or sunset unfold. Many times over the course of a sunrise or sunset I’ve photographed in every direction.
The image here was captured at the start of a particularly vivid sunrise. The air was clean, with just the right mix of clouds and clear sky; perfectly calm air allowed the lake’s surface to smooth to glass. I find that the more I can anticipate skies like this, the better prepared I am when something spectacular happens. In this case I was at the lake well before the color started, but because it looked like all the sunrise stars were aligning, I was able to plan my composition and settings well before the color started.
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Sunrise, Sunset…
Eloquent Images by Gary Hart 