My photo
... is a freelance photographer working in Middle Georgia

Tuesday, January 13, 2015

Twas a Cold and Foggy Night......


 I love fog, watching lights move through it. And love taking pictures in the fog. Fog shrouds the most common place things in mystery, ads instant intrigue to the mundane.  It can also be difficult to shoot and capture what you see. This image was captured last night in Fort Valley.

Fog acts like a huge diffuser. The water droplets act like mini mirrors reflecting light so it scatters all around. This reduces contrast and color, also reduces the amount of light.  Make sure you are exposing for the fog and not the object in the fog. You may need to overexpose just a little bit to get the image you want.  The contrast and color you will have to fix in post processing.  It helps to shoot as RAW files, the added latitude makes it easier to adjust.

One of the cool things in fog is the way light sources become very directional. It the photo above, the car's headlights and the lights over the gas pumps are like beams. Don't shoot directly into the light source, but at a bit of an angle. All the light is softened, and almost glows.

Objects close to the camera are less effected by these fog factors, while those farter away show more. Telephotos really ad to the fog effect. This image was with the 70-200mm.  Faster lenses can be of much benefit due to the lower light. You may need to bump up your ISO as well.  THis was an exposure of 1/200th second at f2.8, ISO at 1600. 

After shooting I first worked the image in Camera Raw, then Photoshop Elements and Color Efex 4 Pro.

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