Taken from the OR35 view point just south of Hood River on May 5, 2007 at 8:15pm. The reflection of the sun off the cloud and the snow were amazing.
This is not a direct image of the sun setting behind Mt Hood. The setting sun is far to the right of the image. What you see here is the reflection of the sunlight off the snow and cloud.
This was one of the best out of 25 shots taken from 8:10 to 8:18. I was driving out of Hood River about sunset and on a whim decided to checkout Mt Hood.
This time of year, the sun is too far north to get a standard into-the-sun-sunset-shot, but the angle was just right for a reflection.
D200, 1/30 f6.3 ISO260, 170mm with 18-200mm VR zoom on tripod
Added 11:30 7-May-2008.
Marc Dilley noticed a subtle halo around the out of focus foreground trees. It is most noticeable on the right. In searching for the source of the halo, I noticed that the RAW file has a yellow chromatic aberration that cleans up in Lightroom with a -42 correction. This strikes me as odd. While the 18-200 does have some chromatic aberration, this seems a very large correction and one that I've never made before. This makes me wonder whether chromatic aberration is larger when the object is out of focus or is there something going on with the blending of the sunset light with the out of focus green.
Added 8:20 pm 7-May-2008
Replaced the image with a CA corrected image. Haloing on the right is reduced.
Added 10:57pm 7-May-2008
Following onto John Williams' suggestion, the image was replaced with one that has more open shadows. The black tree outline on the right echoes the white left edge of Mt Hood.
George Purvis
George: Despite the utterly stunning capture of the sunset, I'm distracted by the haloing (?) issues in the trees, esp. on the R side. Their soft focus doesn't bother, but perhaps another attempt at processing can fix this. Still, an amazing image; great work!
Whoa, this looks really cool! Like a volcanic eruption! That is some sweet light and color.
I do agree about the trees. It makes one wonder what it would have looked like had you stepped in front of or around them and taken the shot. Although it might not have been possible. Also normally when framing a subject with trees stop down to ~ f16 and bump up ISO if needed. That will help with CA and haloing.
Hi John,
Good point. You're exactly right. The print image is more open (19x13) so it is possible to see the texture, buildings and details in the valley as you move in for inspection, but the shadows are delicate and didn't survive the transition to the smaller jpg. I also noticed that the shadows are more open on some monitors than on others. I'll try to open them up some more.
The dynamic range in the image was rather large. I used the simple HDR technique of blending two files with different exposure values created from the same RAW file to try to squeeze into the 1:128 dynamic range of a print.
Hi Derek,
That's a good point suggestion about stopping down. Thanks. Looking back through the set, I do have a variety of framing including verticals and also exposures to f14 at 1/10 while keeping the ISO to a low 280 (-1 2/3 exposure compensation) and the trees are much cleaner except where a slight breeze seems to have moved some.
George.
Discussion
9 repliesThis is not a direct image of the sun setting behind Mt Hood. The setting sun is far to the right of the image. What you see here is the reflection of the sunlight off the snow and cloud.
This was one of the best out of 25 shots taken from 8:10 to 8:18. I was driving out of Hood River about sunset and on a whim decided to checkout Mt Hood.
This time of year, the sun is too far north to get a standard into-the-sun-sunset-shot, but the angle was just right for a reflection.
D200, 1/30 f6.3 ISO260, 170mm with 18-200mm VR zoom on tripod
Added 11:30 7-May-2008.
Marc Dilley noticed a subtle halo around the out of focus foreground trees. It is most noticeable on the right. In searching for the source of the halo, I noticed that the RAW file has a yellow chromatic aberration that cleans up in Lightroom with a -42 correction. This strikes me as odd. While the 18-200 does have some chromatic aberration, this seems a very large correction and one that I've never made before. This makes me wonder whether chromatic aberration is larger when the object is out of focus or is there something going on with the blending of the sunset light with the out of focus green.
Added 8:20 pm 7-May-2008
Replaced the image with a CA corrected image. Haloing on the right is reduced.
Added 10:57pm 7-May-2008
Following onto John Williams' suggestion, the image was replaced with one that has more open shadows. The black tree outline on the right echoes the white left edge of Mt Hood.
George Purvis
I do agree about the trees. It makes one wonder what it would have looked like had you stepped in front of or around them and taken the shot. Although it might not have been possible. Also normally when framing a subject with trees stop down to ~ f16 and bump up ISO if needed. That will help with CA and haloing.
Good point. You're exactly right. The print image is more open (19x13) so it is possible to see the texture, buildings and details in the valley as you move in for inspection, but the shadows are delicate and didn't survive the transition to the smaller jpg. I also noticed that the shadows are more open on some monitors than on others. I'll try to open them up some more.
The dynamic range in the image was rather large. I used the simple HDR technique of blending two files with different exposure values created from the same RAW file to try to squeeze into the 1:128 dynamic range of a print.
That's a good point suggestion about stopping down. Thanks. Looking back through the set, I do have a variety of framing including verticals and also exposures to f14 at 1/10 while keeping the ISO to a low 280 (-1 2/3 exposure compensation) and the trees are much cleaner except where a slight breeze seems to have moved some.
George.