Seven Sisters Country Park

Silky smooth waters and frantic skies are the outstanding features that we see in a lot of daytime long exposures and so I decided to take the filters out to Seven Sisters Country Park in East Sussex where there is an abundance of both, to continue my experiments with the Lee Big Stopper.

Having checked the calibration of the filter and finding it to be closer to 11.5 stops than 10, I had a much more productive day today. I was also a lot more comfortable with the physical process of setting up the image:

1. Mount the camera on the tripod and adjust height and stability. Legs as wide as they can go.
2. Set the aperture and compose the shot without the filter
3.  Set the focus (either manually or in auto) and check the metered exposure time
4.  Switch from auto to manual focus
5. Attach the viefinder cover
6.  Insert the filter in the track closest to the lens
7.  Work out the desired shutter speed by incrementing the metered time you noted in Step 2 by 10 stops – or 11.6 in my case.
8.  Use the remote trigger in bulb mode to trigger the shutter
9.  Release the shutter
10.  Check the histogram
11.  Repeat until done!

Three Sticks

A couple of tips – I noticed on day 1 that sand and dirt were blowing onto the filter wrap while I was working. Obviously sand and a glass filter will not mix, even worse with the Resin filters – a scratch will ruin the filter permanently. I also worried about accidentally treading or kneeling on one while adjusting the camera settings. The solution, for me was to invest in another camera bag. The Kata DC445 is perfectly sized for the filters in their Lee protective covers. I carry two sets of ND Grads, hard and soft at 0.3, 0.6 and 0.9, a set of ND Glass Filters at 0.3, 0.6 and 0.9 and the Big Stopper. There’s room left over to carry a pan & tilt tripod head too, separated by the dividers provided. As a bonus,  it also provides a platform to shield the wrappers from the wind and keep the filters off the ground. A good investment? Well it works for me. Using the Lee filter system is most suited to Landscape photography where setting up the shot and waiting for the light can take hours, a modus operandi that is a world away from the rapid response mode of the street photographer! Taking one extra bag in addition to the camera bag and tripod is not a big deal if I’m setting out to take landscapes.

On with the show – The shot at the top of the article was 23 seconds at f22. The water in the foreground was very fast moving and this length of exposure was enough to render it milky white. The shot of the river was made with a 30 second exposure at f22. The intention again, was to smooth what was a fairly briskly flowing river until it was glassy smooth. The light was different in this shot, hence the slightly longer exposure time. I was happy to use relatively short exposures because there was so much cloud and I wanted to keep some of that texture.

Learning point was that now that I have the right calibration to use as the basis for calculating the exposure, I can get to a usable image much more quickly. Its still a little less scientific than I would like, but I’m finding that I’m developing a feel for this filter now that allows me to take the calculation and adjust it for changing light conditions etc without engaging in complex mathematics.

Perhaps the greatest lesson was one that has been true for the whole of my experience with photography. At first, engage with the technique. Once you are comfortable with the technique you will find yourself able to engage with the creative side of the image much more effectively.

Related Posts:

• Adventures with the Lee “Big Stopper”
• Brighton & Hove Camera Club – A Short Presentation
• Travels in Beijing
• A Day Out In Delhi
• Poppy Panorama