Dan Martin

http://www.shutterfreaks.com/Tips/Exposure.html
Direct link to PDF: http://www.shutterfreaks.com/Tips/Ex...xposure111.pdf

I found this really in-depth article on how to properly expose a scene and I thought it might be useful to those wishing to learn more about their cameras. The PDF is 41 pages long so as I said, it's quite detailed. However, there is also a good glossary near the back if you're just unsure of a particular term.


If you don't feel up to tackling that big of an article, perhaps this one might be a little easier to swallow: http://www.photo.net/learn/making-photographs/exposure

Cheers,

Dan

waTSX

Good article. I bookmarked it for later. I've been wanting to mess with the hyperfocal distance for awhile, and it's nice to have the formula right there.

That first shot, with the water drops and US flag is really cool.

Dan Martin

I thought the same thing about the water drops. If I was at home, I'd be playing around with that technique right now.

waTSX

Well, if you figure out how, or already know, post it. I'd like to try that myself. Maybe you could do one with the Canadian flag

Dan Martin

It's not too tricky, but in essence, you have to "double focus". You first focus on the drops, then you use the water drops as a lens (diffraction) to focus on the flag. In this case, it would be easiest to set your camera up underneath the glass, focus on the drops, then move the background until you get the desired amount of detail in the drops. It would probably help to have an off-camera flash so you can light the background.

I've done this kind of shot before, but just with a single drop of water coming off a leaf. In that kind of scenario you don't have the luxury of moving the background. This flag shot would be much easier, but it would be fun to try.

waTSX

I see. The drops are on glass. I thought maybe he had frozen them in midair, but looking at it again that couldn't be so; the DoF is uniform on all the drops, so they'd have to be on the same plane, especially given the flag is OOF.

Very cool. I also love the way he arranged the flag in the background. Very well composed. It's one of those shots you can look at for a long time.

Thanks for the info.