Industrialised Nation

[Colin Southern]

I actually shot this 3 to 4 years ago, but didn't process it at the time. Funny how we can some times spot the potential in an image years later as our "eye" changes.

[Donald]

Trademark stuff.

Just what the 'B' setting on the shutter was invented for.

[Bobobird]

Looks more like "Alien Nation"

Great shot.

One thing I have never managed to understand about long exposures is just how long should be the exposure for a given shot. How does one determine that?

Yours is 119 secs -- why? how did you come up with that number?

[Colin Southern]

Trademark stuff.

Just what the 'B' setting on the shutter was invented for.

Thanks Donald

[Colin Southern]

Looks more like "Alien Nation"

Great shot.

One thing I have never managed to understand about long exposures is just how long should be the exposure for a given shot. How does one determine that?

Yours is 119 secs -- why? how did you come up with that number?

Thanks Bobo,

118 seconds was too short, and 120 too long, so I split the difference.

Just kidding It was actually a 2 minute exposure, but for anything over 30 seconds I have to use the Canon TC80-N3 counter/timer - and when I do that, the camera often gets the time wrong in the exit data by a second or two.

Usually the time is dictated to me by other factors like "how much smoothing of water do I want" and "what does the aperture need to be"; in this case I wanted the narrow aperture for the star effects - and I wanted smooth water for the effect it had on the water and steam ... so 2 minutes was what was needed to get a correct exposure.

[Bobobird]

Thanks Colin. That is what I thought until seeing such a precise 119 and got me ruffled.

[rpcrowe]

Colin,

Looking at your image I would really have guessed that your exposure was 117 seconds, so much for guesses

Great shot. I like the panorama type cropping and the long reflections of the lights...

[Colin Southern]

Thanks Colin. That is what I thought until seeing such a precise 119 and got me ruffled.

Actually, I find it quite annoying ... I keep kicking myself for not adding a second onto the counter.

[Colin Southern]

Colin,

Looking at your image I would really have guessed that your exposure was 117 seconds, so much for guesses

Great shot. I like the panorama type cropping and the long reflections of the lights...

Thanks Richard,

Once one goes beyond about 30 seconds then they won't see much difference in the water & steam, so any additional time is usually just for the benefit of the likes of clouds and/or stars etc.

I had someone else text me to say that they really like that shot too; personally, I like it, but it's not one of my favourites -- perhaps I should do more greyscale images?

[jeeperman]

Nice work Colin. I love the movement in a mostly static scene.

[Colin Southern]

Nice work Colin. I love the movement in a mostly static scene.

Thanks Paul

I should have a look through my collection of un-processed images to see how many other nugetts are hiding in there!