Got up before dawn cracked this morning to watch the sunrise over Toronto at Humber Bay Park... Definitely worth getting up for - only wish the images came out sharper... will need to figure out what I did wrong and go back to try again! The prevailing opinion is that I used too high an f/stop... Next time I will play around with that a bit more...
Today is a stat holiday and it was a good day from a photo perspective... in addition to dragging my butt out of bed and getting myself into a park before 7am (the time in my camera is an hour off - I thought I'd fixed that, but apparently not), I also got to go downtown and scout out some places I want to get to during the week...
Wonderful colors and textures! Look forward to hearing what you change on your settings next time as I would have gone for an aperture about the same :)
Beautiful!! Nice reflections! I'd probably try an f/stop around the 16? I'm no expert on this.... but I've heard from somewhere (can't think where) that it's around a good f/stop for these types of shots.
The reason that small apertures (large f-numbers) cause a loss of sharpness is due to diffraction -- this is an effect where light will diverge when passing through a very small hole (in this case, the camera's iris). The smaller the hole, the more the light diverges.
If this divergence is too great, sharp features will be projected onto several adjacent sensor 'pixels' in the camera, causing them to appear fuzzy. It is useful to be aware of where diffraction will start to affect your image, which is based on the specifications of your camera.
Scroll down to 'Diffraction Limited Aperture Calculator' (near the bottom) and enter the specifications for your camera -- sensor size is typically 1.6x for consumer Canon DSLRs, and 1.5x for consumer Nikon DSLRs. When you enter this and the megapixel count of your camera and hit calculate, you will get three figures. The second one ('Diffraction Limits Extinction Resolution') is the setting above which, if you have everything else perfect (no camera shake, perfect focus, etc.) you may start to see some loss of detail.
As always, this is a tradeoff between where your lens becomes sharpest (consumer lenses are typically fuzzy when 'wide open' due to optical deficiencies) and where your camera starts to lose detail due to diffraction. Fortunately, most cameras today will hit that point between f/8 and f/11, which is also the point at which even cheap lenses are typically very sharp.
Certainly when shooting using a high-resolution DSLR like the T2i, an aperture of f/32 will result in a significant loss of sharpness. Unless necessary for either depth of field or shutter speed reasons, I would try and avoid going over f/11 or under f/8 when shooting landscape shots for optimal sharpness with most of today's cameras.
Having said that, it's an absolutely beautiful shot, I love the reflections of the morning clouds in the still water, there's just the right amount of detail. Keeping the bright sky at the horizon from being blown out is excellent control, and the composition with the TO skyline is stunning.
@ozziehoffy@northy it is worth trying a variety of f stops and exposure lengths. A lot of mine I do at f22 because I want to maximize exposure length. I have on occasion gone down to f5.6 with a shorter exposure in the right conditions if I want to a shallower dof. At f11 to f22 the dof won't really matter that much with a large landscape because the detail of surroundings will be nicely focused but the water effects will be maximized.
I think it's very atmospheric. It looks to me that the rock has a lot of the focus, were you on the infinity focus? Regardless, it feels moody and misty.
tx Alexis... i know i need to learn this stuff better... but sounds like boils down to needing to use a lower f/stop... i've used the f/22 in a number of other long-exposure circumstances that seemed to turn out ok - but clearly not here...
tx Peter... guess i should have played around more with aperture... i did want a full range on shutter speed and played quite a bit with that...
lesson learned... and i don't feel too badly about it... the main thing that had me angsting this morning was what if i picked the wrong spot? or the park was closed when i got there? or i got mugged (yes - i went out there alone - my husband wasn't too happy about it and told me not to be afraid to use my tripod as a weapon if i needed to!)... anyway, decided to go because there would have to be a first time to make mistakes so there could be a second time with fewer mistakes... and i was pretty happy with what i got given it was my first go at a sunrise shoot and all :)
this is a beautiful morning shot of the city and a great location to capture it from. I was at this very spot trying to get a full moon shot in early August but a thunderstorm rolled in and took care of that.
@roth bummer about the full moon! any lightening shots? are you in the west end? somehow i thought you were in Scarborough... Humber Bay Park would be a long way to travel for a full moon!
@northy no lightening shots and yes I am in Scarborough, but I like to go out to the west end a lot, mostly High Park but I recently discovered Humber Bay park and loved it!
It's a beautiful early morning shot of the city, different for you. I wouldn't worry too much about the loss of clarity, even viewed large it looks pretty darn good.
@russianblue kass... When we were driving home from the sault, there was a spectacular view of the sunset south of Barrie... It was over fields and w a low pov you would have a fabulous silhouette view of a line of trees against the setting sun... I almost made my husband pull off so I could shoot it but it had been a long day and the kids were tired and grumpy... But srsly - a spectacular view if you ever have the opportunity :)
Nice! It could be too high an f-stop although diffraction effects usually come in at f/16 or more. Are you using a zoom lens - at 17mm I guess you are. If its a 17-85 or similar lens I would try it at say 20mm. Zooms are not at their best wide open. 18-20mm at f/8 on a tripod is worth a try.
If this divergence is too great, sharp features will be projected onto several adjacent sensor 'pixels' in the camera, causing them to appear fuzzy. It is useful to be aware of where diffraction will start to affect your image, which is based on the specifications of your camera.
There is a calculator that can be used here:
http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/diffraction-photography-2.htm
Scroll down to 'Diffraction Limited Aperture Calculator' (near the bottom) and enter the specifications for your camera -- sensor size is typically 1.6x for consumer Canon DSLRs, and 1.5x for consumer Nikon DSLRs. When you enter this and the megapixel count of your camera and hit calculate, you will get three figures. The second one ('Diffraction Limits Extinction Resolution') is the setting above which, if you have everything else perfect (no camera shake, perfect focus, etc.) you may start to see some loss of detail.
As always, this is a tradeoff between where your lens becomes sharpest (consumer lenses are typically fuzzy when 'wide open' due to optical deficiencies) and where your camera starts to lose detail due to diffraction. Fortunately, most cameras today will hit that point between f/8 and f/11, which is also the point at which even cheap lenses are typically very sharp.
Certainly when shooting using a high-resolution DSLR like the T2i, an aperture of f/32 will result in a significant loss of sharpness. Unless necessary for either depth of field or shutter speed reasons, I would try and avoid going over f/11 or under f/8 when shooting landscape shots for optimal sharpness with most of today's cameras.
Having said that, it's an absolutely beautiful shot, I love the reflections of the morning clouds in the still water, there's just the right amount of detail. Keeping the bright sky at the horizon from being blown out is excellent control, and the composition with the TO skyline is stunning.
tx Alexis... i know i need to learn this stuff better... but sounds like boils down to needing to use a lower f/stop... i've used the f/22 in a number of other long-exposure circumstances that seemed to turn out ok - but clearly not here...
tx Peter... guess i should have played around more with aperture... i did want a full range on shutter speed and played quite a bit with that...
lesson learned... and i don't feel too badly about it... the main thing that had me angsting this morning was what if i picked the wrong spot? or the park was closed when i got there? or i got mugged (yes - i went out there alone - my husband wasn't too happy about it and told me not to be afraid to use my tripod as a weapon if i needed to!)... anyway, decided to go because there would have to be a first time to make mistakes so there could be a second time with fewer mistakes... and i was pretty happy with what i got given it was my first go at a sunrise shoot and all :)