Textures In The Sand

Some recent experiments in light and textures from at the beach. Any thoughts?

Wow! That first shot looks like an embossed mountain range!

The second one: I really like how at first glance, the water could be either side, because they are very similarly textured.

Third: Looks like a soft rock with a carving in it, really cool!

Thank you Matt, much appreciated :)

(For those reading Matt's comments, I went to change something after posting and shots 1 and 3 got reversed. Just thought I'd mention it to keep his comments straight.)

errr...not a whole lot of light there....hmmm....

The middle one is the one that I like. There really isn't anything in it to give perspective and let you know exactly what you are looking at. Pretty good exposure and contrast too except perhaps the lighter area at the top.

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Originally Posted by AgingEyes

errr...not a whole lot of light there....hmmm....

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errr...I do believe your aging eyes deceive you for there was plenty of light for these shots :D

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Originally Posted by MB1

The middle one is the one that I like. There really isn't anything in it to give perspective and let you know exactly what you are looking at. Pretty good exposure and contrast too except perhaps the lighter area at the top.

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Thanks MB1 :) Wasn't sure if I should include a shell or something in the shot. Decided just to leave it plain and simple to see how it would come out.

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Originally Posted by Xia_Ke

errr...I do believe your aging eyes deceive you for there was plenty of light for these shots :D

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Hey, at least I got my name right :-) :-)

LOL... Just teasing you AE :) So you think they should be a bit a lighter?

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Originally Posted by Xia_Ke

LOL... Just teasing you AE :) So you think they should be a bit a lighter?

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My 2 cents, Yes I feel there a little dark. But you also don't want them too light either. The third one is just about correct for the lightness.

I like one and three. The first one looks like a satellite image of another planet, if you removed the stick. one and three both would make vary nice abstracts. The second one needs more detail in the water. Nice shooting Aaron

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Originally Posted by freygr

My 2 cents, Yes I feel there a little dark. But you also don't want them too light either. The third one is just about correct for the lightness.

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That was exactly my dilemma. It's a very thin line with beach sand. I elected to shoot underexposing a stop on 1 & 3 in th hopes of keeping the grains of the sand clearly visible. I really didn't play with them in post processing. I'll have to see how they look if I adjust them for the stop of underexposing. The cool thing with the first shot is that the sand is actually flat with the exception of the veins. There was some sediment in the sand that made for a weird effect.

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Originally Posted by Greg McCary

I like one and three. The first one looks like a satellite image of another planet, if you removed the stick. one and three both would make vary nice abstracts. The second one needs more detail in the water. Nice shooting Aaron

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Thanks Greg :) I thought about taking out the stick but was too worried I would ruin the texture of the sand making it look unnatural. Plus, part of me kinda liked the touch of perspective it adds.

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Originally Posted by Xia_Ke

LOL... Just teasing you AE :) So you think they should be a bit a lighter?

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I liked the middle image but I felt the sand was way to dark. So I used the curve tool and attached is the screen shot. Please go ahead and let me know you feelings.....

Thanks freygr :) I suppose it all depends on what you want to go for with that one. I was going for kind of a ying-yang effect so I opted to have the sand be quite dark. I do like your version as well though.

I really don't want to play with the lighting on #3 but, here's the other 2 with some lightening...

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Originally Posted by Xia_Ke

LOL... Just teasing you AE :) So you think they should be a bit a lighter?

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Ahh...yeah ;-)

The first one and the third one have a lot of greys and only small areas of white and black. So that makes them look dark to my...ahem..aging eyes (all pun intended :-)

The second one I think it can use...how should I put it...how about the beach is not bright enough? ;-)

And I thought for beach one should open up one or two stop, the opposite of what you did? I mean, the beach is lighter than 18% grey, unless you use incident light metering. No?

It is lighter than 18% and is real easy to blow out or loose the grain detail, at least IME anyway. The shot I envisioned was on the dark side and very granular sand. This is fairly close to what I had in mind at the time. As to it's effectiveness now... I dunno. I'm still learning more and more every time I go out. I will have to try to do more bracketing in the future for comparison. Still can't quite predict how final shots will turn out after development.

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Originally Posted by Xia_Ke

It is lighter than 18% and is real easy to blow out or loose the grain detail,

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It shouldn't be. Say you meter the sand, which is lighter than 18% grey. The reading the meter gives you (reflective reading I'm talking about) put it back to 18% grey. You open up one stop it's still Zone VI in the Zone system. It'd just lighter than mid-grey but it's still grey with details. Details should still be there up to Zone VIII, i.e., three stop over. Not a whole lot but still visible. For a beach under the sun I'd at least open up two stop, i.e., put the beach in Zone VII. If I feel like taking some risk and it's really bright, I'd even put it in Zone VIII. Of course, I'm only talking a shot of the beach and not taking into consideration of any other elements in the whole picture. Oh, I think you shoot film, don't you?

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The shot I envisioned was on the dark side and very granular sand. This is fairly close to what I had in mind at the time.

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If so, then you have your reason. You were there, I wasn't. And it's your shot. Your call.

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As to it's effectiveness now... I dunno. I'm still learning more and more every time I go out. I will have to try to do more bracketing in the future for comparison. Still can't quite predict how final shots will turn out after development.

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You shoot film? Have you tried shooting a mid-grey card with different exposures (both over and under), then develop the film, print them out and see what tones of grey different exposures would give you?

These are very nice, Aaron! I like all three of them, but I think the third is my favorite. I always like playing with textures. The only critique I have is the slightly blown out water in the second shot. Could be your post processing, but if not, I little shorter development would fix that. Are these 35mm?

Paul

These are all very good, Aaron. The first and third are the strongest imo. the first looks like writing/drawings found on a cave wall. the third shot is very interesting with it's shapes and textures, but I feeling a slightly more straight on approach as opposed to the sharper angle you have there might have been better.
The second shot I like darker as you posted it originally.The extreme contrast is part of the positive about this image. The lack of some more detail and texture in the water especially near the top weakens this to a large extent but it still holds my attention and that is important.
I like the photos as you originally posted them, dark, but I do feel the first one has improved by your exposing some more detail.
Good works here.

AE - I didn't even think about it terms of full Zone placement. When I was shooting the sand, I metered for #3 using the Oly's internal meter. Just as a personal preference, I find I like it then a little under exposed. That particular shot was damp, regular beach sand. About 10 feet over was shot 1. This one had some dark mineral deposits with a couple small, real light patches. I opted to leave my settings from the previous sand spot and keep it real dark with some highlights. I have thought about getting a grey card but, part of me would rather just fully try sit down and learn Zone rather just metering a grey card all the time. This whole conversation is making me realize that I'm still not putting enough time and thought into the planning of my shots. At the time what I was doing made perfect sense and I pretty much achieved what I was after. Now in reviewing my whole process used at the time, I'm getting lost :o...LOL

Thanks Paul :) Yes, these are 35mm, shot with the Oly OM-G and 50mm Zuiko. I think I did a very slight contrast increase and cropped off a stray building reflection at the top of the second shot. It was a hard shot to meter for. This was at the point of the beach. The sand was just barely in shade and the sun was rising just around the corner of the end. I was hoping to be just short of blowing out but, a little bit ended just beyond that. This was also my first time pushing TMAX 100. I pushed to 400, going by Kodak's recommended times.

Thanks Gary :) That third shot was a weird spot. There was like this 10' diameter spot rounded out of the shore line. Just off to the side is a bridge, so maybe there was some sort of whirlpool there? It dropped down about 4 feet into the water. The ocean is a little cold at the moment so I opted not to go down in to shoot it flat...LOL It was done just looking straight down. I wish that second shot had a bit more at the top detail wise too :( Nto sure how I could have handled that differently to have had more other than developing the film to compensate for the highlights. Also, it is shot looking down the beach. That top spot was roughly 30 or 40 feet??? away. Maybe shouldn't do such a steep angle as that cost a bit of detail.

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Originally Posted by Xia_Ke

This was also my first time pushing TMAX 100. I pushed to 400, going by Kodak's recommended times.

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Ah...that explains it. Assuming these were all shot on the same roll, this is a perfect example of the roll film / zone system compromise. 1 and 3 are relatively low contrast scenes, and when you pushed the film it increased contrast on the negative. That helped those shots and they look perfect in that regard (IMO). But, the second shot is a high contrast scene already and when you extended development it was too much for the film to handle. You just can't get them all perfect on one roll, but you did very well all things considered.

So basically you're saying I need to just start shooting LF so I have individual shot control?...LOL