In today’s article, I would like to address a very recurring theme among photography lovers, such as sunrise and sunset.These are two “very photogenic” times of the day that we’re all trying to capture at some point.sunrises and sunsets and you don’t get the results you’re looking for, in today’s article I will try to summarize the most important points that you should take care of trying to produce this type of photograph.Remember that what turns a normal photo into a wonderful work of art are the small details that we sometimes don’t pay attention to.
Let’s do it then.
- Although sometimes chance and chance can produce beautiful photos of sunrises and sunsets.
- The truth is that if you want to be sure of getting good results.
- You must plan the session in advance.
- The most interesting moment at sunrise or sunset lasts only a few minutes.
- It is a beautiful and short moment that should not be missed.
- My advice is to find a good place to shoot a day or two in advance.
- Not only look for a good shooting angle.
- Which too.
- But allows you to include interesting elements in the foreground such as a tree.
- Silhouettes.
- Etc.
It is also convenient to observe the time at which the sun rises or sets normally, as you will be interested in visiting the place a little earlier.
Photopills is an application in which you will find everything you need to plan your photos of sunsets and sunrises.
And the weather? Meteorology is another very important aspect to take into account: it is not the same to photograph a cloudy sunrise, everyone has their charm but you need to know what time you are waiting for the next day, so you are ready to take the photo exactly as imagined it.
Planning also involves preparing equipment and preparing everything: backpack, lenses, well-charged battery, formate memory cards, etc.
At sunrise or sunset, you have to be prepared, but really, at least you need:
Don’t forget to apply the third-party rule (link). Being a type of landscape photography, this composition rule is (almost) mandatory.
Regarding the framing, try not to fall into the mistake that many make and that is to photograph completely annoying sunrises or sunsets, all this spectacular landscape that nature has prepared for us needs a remarkable element that breaks the monotony and gives more life to sunrise or sunset. at sunset. , more interest As I said before, this element can be a tree, a palm tree, rocks or the silhouette of a loving couple kissing.
As for the lenses, I personally like to photograph the sunrise and sunset with small focal length lenses, something between 14 and 25 mm, to be able to capture the landscape in its entirety.
However, for a little freedom, I recommend having more lenses with more than one focal length at hand: this way you can capture panoramic landscapes at the same time as high-zoom frames where the sun becomes more important.
With the theme of the exhibition, you have to be a little careful.Precisely, the charm of a sunrise or sunset consists of this light emanating from the sun and to which we aim directly.We already know that our camera in automatic mode tends to make mistakes when focusing direct light, which affects generally underexposed (dark) photos.
If you are going to photograph a sunrise or sunset, use the manual or semi-manual mode of your SLR camera, you can play with the aperture and shooting speed and get different results each time, with different degrees of light (if it is manual mode still scares you, look at my home book for photography.)
You should also pay attention to white balance.Although most of the time leaving the camera in the automatic white balance, you get very correct photos, sometimes the sunrises and sunsets have a warmth of color (tending to yellow / orange) without which the photo would lose its charm, an automatic white balance detects this “hot” tone as an excess and tries to change it to a more neutral color, which we don’t really want.Workaround: Change the white balance settings and choose the one that preserves the warm tone of the moment, cloudy or shaded for example (more information about white balance here).
Please don’t take another cold, impersonal and anonymous photo of a sunrise or sunset.Take a different photo, turn that sunrise or sunset into a personal moment leaving a subtle hint of you in the photo: it could be a doll you love, your child’s toy car, your Boby dog’s silhouette posing in the foreground, or just take the photo from your attic window, describing what you see every day when you wake up in the morning.
Did you enjoy this article? Help me spread the word by giving you a recommendation on Facebook, Twitter or Google.I’ll be infinitely grateful to you.