Yorgo Nestoridis

Copyright © 2010 Yorgo Nestoridis. Visit the original article at http://yorgonestoridis.com/yorgo-nestoridis-media/how-to-take-sunset-photos/.

Sunset with Expression and Emotion

Agios is located in north Evia, just a few kilometers from the famous thermal sources of Edipsos. The below pictures from Agios have been shot in July 2010. The images from Astir Beach are from August 2010.

Evia located north of Attica. it’s the second largest Greek island after Crete. The best known place in north Evia is Edipsos. The curative thermal springs have been known for thousands of years; from the old Greeks to the Romans and more recently to Sir Winston Churchill, Onassis and many other well known personalities.

Shooting Sunset Photos

Sunsets are a beautiful natural spectacle. The ever changing light conditions under the declining sun offer great photographic opportunities and challenges.

Everybody can take sunset pictures, it’s not all that difficult: just point your digital camera and shoot … the automatic settings will do the rest. If you want however take a more stunning sunset, the one that knocks even an ice-bear out of his socks, then you may consider some of the following aspects and try them out.

Light and Colors

In order to take a smashing picture, you need dust and or clouds. The red and orange colors result from micro-particles in the air. Dust can come from anywhere, pollution helps to break light, smoke, fog and so on. A second element for great effects are Clouds.

Clouds add structure, interesting light effects and in as much as I am concerned, I prefer the cloudy sky to the straight gradients resulting from a cloudless and dust-free atmosphere.

The Horizon

Look at your scenery and decide what’s more important to you: the sky of the foreground. The more beautiful your sky the more of it you want to ban on your photo. In general it’s of good advise to follow the rule of thirds.

The first image above features two horizons: one in the foreground and one in the back-ground. The foreground horizon is placed about on the lower third line, while the back-ground horizon is at the boring 50% level. The sun is on the first third line from the left.

The second photo focuses clearly on the sky. The horizon is just below the one third line from the bottom.

Applying the rule of thirds will help to focus on the essential aspects of the sunset and adds tension to the image. Of course there are always exceptions and you may find yourself in a situation where the totally balanced and centered approach will reflect tranquility and desired harmony; as usual, it will depend on the story you want to tell.

The Composition

The sunset is spectacular and usually it becomes more spectacular if it’s seen in an interesting context. The foreground is what often gives the special touch” a few palm trees, a jetty, a bridge, people or most any object which adds a scale to your picture.

For the purpose of this post I add a photo from Kavouri beach in Vouliagmeni, where the focus is on the busy foreground.

Your creativity is the limit.

It seems to be a commonly accepted rule, that foregrounds are represented as dark silhouettes, herefore your flash should be set to “off”. In some cases however it may be interesting to capture some reflections from a foreground, such as the ones you can see on the cars parked at Kavouri Beach or the small reflections from the town in the foreground of the first image from Agios above. Context matters and adds expression.

The Frame

This is part of your composition. Experiment with the frame; make it wider or narrower depending on the story you want to tell. It’s better to frame when you take the picture than to cut the image in Photoshop or any other image editor. If you use zoom, make sure to remain within the range of your optical zoom and don’t use the digital zoom to preserve a maximum of quality, data and image size.

In Agios I thought there was an interesting frame focusing on the sea, separating the island of Evia from the main land (Attica).

The image is full of harmony, smooth gradients and tints around the golden reflection of the sunset in the sea. The sky is of no importance here; it’s all a matter of light and tints in for my taste, very nice proportions.

The Exposure

This is probably the most important and also most difficult issue, namely with digital cameras. In automatic settings, digital cameras most often use matrix metering which is reflected by an average exposure and results in under-exposed photos. The issue is due to the huge extremes between highlights and shadows.

For best results, it’s recommended to use a a metering device and meter the two extremes as well as the environmental light and average in function of the priority set by your composition and the story you want to tell.

The best advise is: just experiment! There is never just one right exposure as different exposures will produce great results, however the effects are different. Again, it’s a matter of what you wish to express with your picture.

Professionals use bracketing and so may you. Most digital cameras have a bracketing function; when you shoot,the cam will take 3 pictures: one as per automatic or manually set metering, one with one F-stop higher and one with a F-stop lower. Say you take the picture at 1/60 s at f/8, the cam will take a shot at these settings, then one at 1/60s at f/5.6 and one at 1/60 s at f/11. You will then be able to select the most expressive shot.

The trouble is in the highlights. Digital cameras’ sensors are very sensitive to light. The danger consists thus in overexposure of highlights which boils down to a reduced dynamic range in the light areas of your picture (lack of gradients, texture and structure).Your digital camera may have a iHighlight function,which may remedy or different presets for the white balance.

Sunset pictures as well as night photos are interesting subjects for HDR photography: shoot multiple shots from your tripod at different settings and mash them up in Photoshop with the HDR feature. The trick may help as the extreme light zones and the extreme darks may your camera cause to think for you (and that you definitely don’t want …) and select either priority. The camera’s choice will most often result in a loss of dynamic range throughout the spectrum, namely if you are shooting with a lower end point and shoot cam.

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