During April (and lockdown) I found myself a little unmotivated to go out and make photographs, so I have been struggling with what to share with you this month. Filtering my Lightroom catalog to show the photos I took in April it came to a total of 64 shots and from only two shoots. So, I decided I would share three very different images from one of those shoots, all taken at the same location over an hour and all using ND filters.
It was an overcast morning which made the light show more subtle and fleeting, for this reason I found myself improvising and thinking about the creative ways I could use ND filters rather than quickly adjusting my set up in response to the light as it changed.
Toi Toi Whispers
Positioned at a high point over the Mangawhai estuary I thought the Toi Toi might make an interesting foreground. Using the ND filter to create a longer shutter speed allowed me to capture the movement of the Toi Toi as they were blown about in the wind. The colours were rather dull, so I processed the image in sepia to bring out more of the textures, shapes, tones and lines in the landscape.
Beams
This was the morning light show. To make the light show the focus I moved left to exclude the Toi Toi from the image. As the sun rose it found cracks in the clouds to make its presence felt.
Complimentary
As the intensity of the sunlight faded behind the clouds, I got my 'creative on' and wondered what handheld panning would offer. Using my camera as a paint brush, I played around with combinations of different movements and directions and came out with some different types of images. I do like this approach to photography as you never know what you are going to get!
When making photographs, I often find myself improvising and this was one of those occasions. The sunrise was not what I was hoping for, but I took the opportunity to get creative. And in the words of David duChemin, "Taking what you've been given and working with it, moving with the energy rather than against it, is a vital part of creative improvisation."
Thanks for visiting and reading, to see more of my images check out the galleries and if you want to read more Monthly Moments check out the links below.