# Dune Sunset last night



## buckas (Jun 13, 2008)

Hi guys, few shots from sunset last night - down at freshwater west again. climbed up and shot these from the top of the dunes

#1










#2










#3










all were shot with 2 + 3stop hard ND grads stacked with 4 stop ND - thanks for looking 

drew


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## SURFERROSA (Feb 7, 2007)

Utterly brilliant shots. Just paid over 200 quid for a couple of Alan Campbell framed Skye photos and I honestly think that yours could be the next one I'm after. 

Fantastic photos.:thumb:


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## M4D YN (Nov 24, 2007)

SURFERROSA said:


> Utterly brilliant shots. Just paid over 200 quid for a couple of Alan Campbell framed Skye photos and I honestly think that yours could be the next one I'm after.
> 
> Fantastic photos.:thumb:


i agree ^^:thumb::thumb::thumb:


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## Mark M (Nov 29, 2006)

Cracking shots!


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## Archway (Apr 3, 2007)

stunning mate !


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## stargazer (Aug 9, 2006)

very nice indeed


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## buckas (Jun 13, 2008)

thanks guys, much appreciated 



SURFERROSA said:


> Utterly brilliant shots. Just paid over 200 quid for a couple of Alan Campbell framed Skye photos and I honestly think that yours could be the next one I'm after.
> 
> Fantastic photos.:thumb:


cheers fella  - just looked at his site, some lovely pics! we're up at skye in septemeber, can't wait :thumb:

drew


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## buckas (Jun 13, 2008)

buckas said:


> all were shot with 2 + 3stop hard ND grads stacked with 4 stop ND


explained 

ND stands for Neutral Density, they're filters (my one's are 5inch X 4inch resin) you slot into a filter holder which attaches to the screw ring on the end of the lens

Grad = Graduated

which means the ND Grad filters go from Black coloured gradiating down past half way to transparent - you can buy these in different strengths to suit your needs

These are rated in "stops" i.e. in exposure f/4, f/5.6 etc

0.3 = 1 stop
0.6 = 2 stop
0.9 = 3 stop
1.2 = 4 stop
1.5 = 5 stop
....
3.0 = 10 stop

the higher the stop, the more dense the filter is

when you take a pic of a landscape, the sky will be loads brighter than the ground, so when exposing the image, you'll either:

- over expose the sky and correctly exposing the ground
- under expose the ground and correctly exposing the sky

to combat this we use a Graduated Neutral Density filter by darkening down the sky for instance

so you expose your image so as the final outcome will expose the foreground/landscape correctly then work out how many stops brighter the sky is to correctly expose this

Then you use the correct "stop" filter for this and position it on the sky section, now you have the sky correctly exposed and the foreground correctly exposed which makes for a nicer image

the 1.2 ND i mention is a 4inch X 4 inch resin filter that has no gradient of black - these can be used on their own or stacked with others to create desired effects, such as

prolonging use of shutter speed to blur objects, such as moving water, of clouds moving with wind

hope that helps, will answer anymore questions if needed 

cheers

drew


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## dubnut71 (Jul 25, 2006)

Top one does it for me, definitely a £200 shot, easily of commercial quality, hope you find an outlet for them mate!:thumb:


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## dps1973 (Dec 18, 2008)

Amazing!!! :thumb::thumb::thumb:


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## Shiny (Apr 23, 2007)

Great stuff Drewster! :thumb: I'm gonna have to learn more about filters.







...but what's all this "climbing" up the dunes? I know that you just peered over the top of them....possibly even crouched down! :lol::lol:


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## buckas (Jun 13, 2008)

cheers guys 



Shiny said:


> Great stuff Drewster! :thumb: I'm gonna have to learn more about filters.
> 
> ...but what's all this "climbing" up the dunes? I know that you just peered over the top of them....possibly even crouched down! :lol::lol:










:lol:

cheers shinester - loving filters myself, only got into them over the past few months but make a massive improvement in what & how to shoot things 

I use Hitech filters using a lee holder+
wide angle adaptor ring in my lens size (luckily both are 77mm)

after reading loads on potn.net i decided on these ones, hitech filters are comparable to the lee filters as they are black and there's no grey colour cast like the cokin ones

chose 0.6 (2 stop) + 0.9 (3 stop) Hard ND Grads and 0.6 (2 stop) + 0.9 (3 stop) Soft ND Grads.....also got 1.2 (4 stop) and 3.0 (10 stop) ND's

hard grads you use when the transition between the sky and ground is a very straight line, soft grads you use when the transition between the sky and ground is a uneven, such as mountains etc

few places to read up on i found useful

http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=224448

also great articles on here > http://www.nd-magazine.com/articles/

oh another tip i learnt is that the water reflection of a sky for instance is two stops (0.6 filter) darker than the exposure of the sky

any questions i'll try to answer them

thanks again all

drew


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## chris l (Mar 5, 2007)

Stunning mate:thumb:


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## natjag (Dec 14, 2008)

nice set of pictures. Why would you want to use a ND filter as well? I understand the grads, but not the ND. I can't see from this picture why you would want to increase the exposure time.


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## spitfire (Feb 10, 2007)

As said above, nice pics. What size could you enlarge them to without losing quality, 10x16 or 10x8?


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## Maxtor (Feb 23, 2007)

Stunning shots mate! :thumb:


Maxtor.


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## buckas (Jun 13, 2008)

thanks guys 



spitfire said:


> As said above, nice pics. What size could you enlarge them to without losing quality, 10x16 or 10x8?


30"x20" 



natjag said:


> nice set of pictures. Why would you want to use a ND filter as well? I understand the grads, but not the ND. I can't see from this picture why you would want to increase the exposure time.


thanks - used the ND to get the sea and clouds blurred


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## spitfire (Feb 10, 2007)

buckas said:


> thanks guys
> 
> *30"x20"*


What format did you use and did you crop them at all? Just thinking about grain.


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## buckas (Jun 13, 2008)

dSLR (22.5mm sensor...will be 35mm v.soon!) no crop - close inspection i guess you'd notice pixels/grain but prints those big are to be admired from afar 

drew


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## bretti_kivi (Apr 22, 2008)

yep, I've had some stuff from a 10MP sensor blown up to A2 and you start to see the grain if you're looking for it and only then.

Bret


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## IGADIZ (May 21, 2006)

Beautiful images Drew... I took the liberty of adjusting one of them I hope you don't mind.


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