CAPTURE NEW HORIZONS

Today is race day at the  Autodromo Internazionale Enzo e Dino Ferrari di   Imola and after rain yesterday is was with to the relief of the whole paddock that the weather has turned 'Italian' this morning with unbroken sunshine and high temperatures on the forecast today. I walked from the hotel to the track and stopped off to take some sunny pictures for the official ELMS website.  The first was of the sun reflecting off the trucks lined up in the paddock before I headed into the pitlane where the Murphy Prototypes team were practising their pitstops ahead of this afternoon's race. All the images were taken on a Fujifilm X-T1 with a Fujinon 10-24mm f4 fitted with a Lee 0.6 soft ND Grad filter. CLICK HERE for more information on the European Le Mans Series.  The race starts at 14h00 (European Time) and will be streamed live on the website. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------...

At this time of year getting up to catch a sunrise isn't as big a chore as it is in the summer thanks to the sun coming up over the horizon at a more reasonable 07:35.  This morning the promise of clear skies had me heading out to Seacliffe  because the combination of a reasonable sunrise time and a low tide gave me the opportunity to get some closer shots of the Firth of Forth Outer Marker, which is normally inaccessible due to the tide with Bass Rock in the background. When I arrived at Seacliffe the horizon was just a purple glow so I decided to walk to the waters edge and set up the tripod to capture the scene out towards Bass Rock and Tantallon Castle.  I decided to get some movement in the surf by selecting a slow shutter speed of around 1/4 second.  This meant setting up in the surf and I quickly discovered that my right boot isn't waterproof like the left one, but I ignored my wet sock and continued shooting with the surf lapping around my ankles. ...

A promise of a nice sunrise had me out of bed before dawn however the reality was a fleeting red sky followed by a very soft and flat light as the sun went behind the rain clouds that were coming in from the west.  I decided to head down to the rocks opposite Dunbar Castle and the harbour entrance. After a few shots at around 0.5 seconds I decided to try a long exposure shot to see what the effect would be on the fairly choppy sea and slow moving cloud layers.  Setting the camera to 'Bulb' and the aperture to f11 @ ISO200, the exposure with the Lee 'Big Stopper' fitted was 16 minutes.  I gave the exposure an extra minute and the result was an interesting, but fairly flat image. Using the NIK Analogue Efex 2 software I used one of my custom settings to improve the image, shifting the colour to a slightly warmer tone.  The effect of the conversion, coupled with the long exposure, has given the shot a 'dreamy' finish, bordering on 'bad dream' wit...

Last week, before I set off for Shanghai, I went down to Barns Ness before dawn to complete the next part of my East Lothian timelapse project I am working on when I am not away traveling for the FIA World Endurance Championship. Before the sun came up over the horizon I decided to take a very long exposure of the lighthouse on the Fujifilm X-T1 with the Lee Filters 10x ND 'Big Stopper' filter.  Using the XF14mm f2.8 lens fitted with a 0.6 ND soft grad filter and the Big Stopper, the exposure was 600 seconds (10 minutes) at f8, ISO400. Using the rock and the ripples in the sand as foreground interest I set the camera to record the scene for a long 10 minutes.  The final image was converted to mono in Silver EFEX Pro 2 software. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- PLEASE SUPPORT THIS BLOG BY VISITING THE ADVERTISERS ON THIS PAGE By clicking on the adverts you are helping support ...

Yesterday evening the promises of a nice sunset had me grabbing the camera bag and tripod and heading out to Barns Ness in the car.  I haven't been out to the lighthouse for a couple of months and yesterday was time for another visit to one of my favourite photographic haunts in and around my home town of Dunbar. One of the techniques I haven't used for a few weeks is a long exposure using the Lee 'Big Stopper' 10x ND filter so I set the tripod up on the rocky shoreline facing east towards the lighthouse and with the sun behind me providing a distinctive glow to the scene.  With the 'Big Stopper' fitted to the Fujinon 14mm f2.8 lens, the exposure time was 90 seconds (f16 and 200ISO) so this gave me time to take some other shots on the X-Pro1 and 10-24mm f4 lens while I waited. After taking several shots of the lighthouse I moved the X-T1 and the tripod out onto a rocky outcrop, keeping an eye on the sea that was approaching high tide.  The second long ...