Quick xes for long exposures

There are a number of aspects you should be

aware of if youre going to get good results

Dark corners

ND grad

If you stack lters, theres a

chance youll see the edge of
the front lter in the corner
of the image. Its worth
checking the Live View
screen before you shoot
unlike most viewnders, this
shows the full 100% view.

If the sky is brighter

than the land, theres
a chance that detail
here will be burned out,
especially if you use
a very long exposure.
To solve this, t an ND
grad lter in front of the
ND lter, with the dark
portion over the sky.

White balance
Very strong ND lters can
leave your pictures with a
colour cast. You can x this
by choosing the Kelvin (K)
option in the White Balance
menu, but wed recommend
changing the Picture Quality
to Raw and altering the white
balance when you process
the image instead.

Circular
polariser
The amount of light
passing through the lter
is reduced by around 2.5
stops at full polarisation,
which needs to be
factored into your long
exposure calculations.

can be used in different combinations to

give you plenty of options when it comes to
nessing the long-exposure effect. Each ND
lter is rated by the amount of exposure
stops of light it blocks. As the name
indicates, a 3-stop lter reduces the light so
that a shutter speed three stops slower than
would normally be used to record a picture
is required. If your camera suggests an
exposure of 1/40 sec at f/16 without a lter,

then adding the three-stop ND would let you

achieve the same overall exposure using 1/5
sec at f/16. Remember that each stop
represents double the length of exposure;
so 1/40 to 1/20 is the rst stop, 1/20 to 1/10
the second stop and 1/10 to 1/5 the third
stop. Somewhat confusingly, though, the
same 3-stop lter can be rated ND8 or
0.9ND, depending on the system that
different manufacturers use.

A very subtle
amount of blur
can simply end
up looking like
a mistake

STEP BY STEP

Set up your Canon D-SLR for long exposures

Four simple steps to get your camera ready for slow-shutter-speed shots

Select Bulb mode

Use a remote release Block the viewnder Activate Live View

Bulb mode allows you to

shoot slower than 30 secs.
Some cameras have a dedicated
Bulb option (B) on the mode dial.
If yours doesnt, select Manual
mode (M) and scroll past 30
secs until bulb appears.

Bulb mode starts the

exposure when you press
the shutter release and ends it
when you take your nger off it.
Youll likely jerk the camera when
you do this, so its far better to
use a remote release instead.

You need to prevent stray

light from entering the
viewnder or you may end up
with ghostly halos. The 1D X has
a built-in viewnder blind, while
other Canon D-SLRs come with a
replacement rubber eyepiece.

Live View enables you to

compose and manually
focus, even with a strong 10-stop
ND lter on the lens. Take a
spare battery the combination
of long exposure times and Live
View chews through the power.

PhotoPlus January 2015 | 73