How to Take long Exposure Images

Introduction

Shutterspeed is the key to taking long exposure images which are striking and convey structure together with movement within the landscapes you are capturing.

This is the first of a short series of Blogs explaining how I take  Long Exposure landscape images, in this series I will deal with waterfalls, the coast and Clouds

This first of the series will cover waterfalls and the types of filter that are available to the reader and the system I use in my landscape photography.

Neutral Density Filter Types

Neutral density filters allow you to extend  your exposure by blocking out some of the light without affecting the image colour, by doing this you are able to control your shutterspeed and thus the appearance of any flowing water in the image. 

One thing  to consider when buying neutral density filters is that the cheaper filters can introduce a significant colour cast to the image which is difficult to remove in post production as such it's always best to go with a recognised brand.

There are a number systems and manufactures out there, however they are generally split in to two main types square/ rectangle and circular.

The square filters require a filter holder and I believe are used more widely by landscape photographers as this system allows you to use more than one filter at the same time. 

This is not the case with circular filters, however with circular  it is possible to get variable ND filters which is an advantage as they allow you to adjust  the level of neutral density filtration  you require ranging from 2 to 8 ND.

Probably the most widely used ND filters in terms of landscape photographers are those produced by  LEE Filters Ltd  and of those  the 6 and 10 stop which are known respectively as the Little Stopper and  Big Stopper are probably the most used by.

In addition to neutral density filters it is sometimes an advantage to also use a polarizing filter to take the  surface reflection from the water. This is fairly easy to do when using the Lee filter system as there is a dedicated landscape polarising filter which fits into the filter system holder and allows you to load neutral density filters behind.

Shutterspeed

As this blog the series is concerned with waterfalls  let's look at some images taken with different shutter speeds the first is with a long shutter speed of around 30 seconds as you can see this gives the water a white misty appearance, which from a personal point of view you I do not like  but was very popular a few years ago.

This image was taken at 30 sec in Snowdonia of the waterfalls on Watkins Path and gives the more misty effect

The next Image was taken at 1000th of a second as you can see it shows every detail of the flow, again I'm not a great lover of this type of image but in some instances it does work, but from a personal point of view it does not convey the movement in the water.

As you can see this is a different image taken in the Yorkshire Dales at 1000/sec which has frozen the movement in the waterfall

This final image was taken with a shutter speed of a half a second, personally believe of the images above this is the best as It conveys both the movement and the power of the river as it flows over the falls. This is only a personal opinion and you might feel that the more misty images are better or even those which are tack sharp, it's all a matter of choice. 

Again another image from Watkins Path, this at 0.5 sec, which around my favourite shutterspeed for waterfalls

Practical Advise

The best advice I can give to get out there and take some images for yourself using the information I've set out above as a rough guide. 

However before you do that just some practical steps and things to think about, firstly weather if there's been a lot of rain in the days prior to you taking the trip the river will be fast flowing and in many instances a muddy colour due to the off run from the surrounding soil.  Secondly overcast conditions generally work better for waterfall photography as you do not get hotspots caused by direct sunlight on parts of image but gentle graduation of light across the scene.

Finally, remember footwear, in many instances in order to get the best composition it may be necessary to stand in the river or at the base of the waterfall. So make sure you got a good pair of wellingtons with strong grips on the sole because the rocks around waterfalls can be very slippery and i personally have on a number of occasion found myself on my backside in the river hugging my camera to prevent it falling getting a dunking