Travelling light: one ol’ Nikon d5100, a Sigma 17-50mm f/2.8 lens, a manfrotto tripod and a corded remote shutter release (because, let’s face it, the cordless ones are shite).
I like Vivid, mostly for the chance to get the streaking lights from the ships as they pass the harbour. Not been since 2014 though, maybe I’ll put some of my faves from back then up too, see if I’ve progressed at all = p
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Had a wander up to Annandale for dinner (Bar Asia – great place) and captured these on the way back, it’s amazing how the lighting affects as the same views on the way up just weren’t appealing (or maybe my mind was more on the delicious tea it was expecting) but as soon as the sun had dipped I had to break the camera out – will be around for a few more on a less cloudy night as there were many more I wanted to capture on the way around the bay on our short trip home but couldn’t afford the time (had a few, erm, let’s say pressing matters to attend to – the foils of a post-dinner shoot)…
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All shot with my Nikon D5100 using the Rokinon 14mm Ultra Wide Angle lens at ISO100, the first two are f/6.3 for 30 seconds and the latter f/2.8 for 20 seconds. Reasoning was I wanted to the maximum time to get the water still and the plane descending but didn’t have the remote on me so couldn’t use the bulb setting. The larger aperture and shorter time on the third was to prevent star trails whilst allowing as much light in as possible – I could’ve probably risked upping the ISO here as even 2-300 shouldn’t see much noise given past experience, but then I don’t want so many stars it detracts from the ones there (again, have this from past experience) – I think Orion in the bottom left stands out quite well, below though I’ve doodled over so you can see more clearly (worked from a google search, his bow may not be 100% accurate..):
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Went back the day after and got another two pictures (now showing as four and five in the row above) that I missed, took me tripod this time and remote shutter – this meant I could dial the aperture all the way down to f/22 and leave it running for 150 secs to really smooth out the water and get some really big starburst on the lights. Downside is the stars you can see are smeared across the sky, I could photoshop them out but I like to keep that to a minimum.
Though, to be honest, it’s more Sydney Harbour. Pam wanted to nip up to take her picture for this weeks 52 week photography challenge so I thought I’d try out my new ultra wide angle lens for some nice panoramics of the harbour (frowned upon by ‘real’ photographers, as ultra wides aren’t for “getting it all in” but hey, I like to experiment :p )
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Darling Harbour Christmas tree – it Sparkles whilst its reflection Shines 😉
Nikon D5100
55mm-300mm DX Telephoto @ 180mm
ISO100
f/20
SS 30 sec
The tree loses a little detail due to the scintillation from across the bay (you could see the live view ‘wobble’ through the haze) but I think the reflection more than makes up for it, I love how the trees bracket it too.
I’ve been aiming to keep the photoshopping to a minimum for this but had to flip it so the 2015 was showing the right way around (also took the liberty to straighten it a little too as the tripod’s only so good at holding in place).
Similar to last weeks challenge I used Helicon Remote on the tablet to help focus with a large live view (manually setting the focus was a case of slight touches either direction to get it just right) and then fire the shutter without introducing any wobble to the camera (though I could have used a corded/wireless remote I guess).
Another handy feature is the bracketing macro it has, I set up a bunch of instructions 30 secs / 100 and then adjusted the aperture down a step for about fifteen pictures until I found the best f stop for the early evening light.
To give a sense of scale, here’s a set-up picture of the cam on the ‘pod, live view streamed to the pad and the tree somewhere over there in the distance!
Link to the original Facebook thread here.
