Sligachan by Onslow
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Description
Firstly I want to thank all those who voted for this image in the July genre challenge.
Some have asked if it is an hdr image, which it is not. I have answered in the forum but I will put here a little bit about the capture and how it was made for anyone who is interested.
The shot is of The Old Bridge at Sligachan, Isle of Skye, the mountain in the background is Glamaig. It was a bright sunny day, not often you can say that about Skye. Glamaig has a topping of a silica rock that reflects lots of light in the sun, it looks almost sugar coated and the bridge is also reflecting lots of light. I wanted to make a capture where the viewer could see the bottom of the stream so I knew I had to balance out the light as this was considerably darker than the top half of the image. I would need to use filters to achieve a balance, so I put a Lee filter holder onto a wide angle lens.
To balance the light I used a soft graduation 3 stop neutral density filter. I also wanted to show some movement in the water so I had to slow my shutter speed down. For this I used a 3 stop neutral density filter. Finally to remove any reflections from the water and to get rid of any specular highlights on the wet rocks, I would need to use a polarising filter and I fitted this in front of the other two filters. That should just about make the scene shootable by balancing the light out and give me a longish shutter time even though the sun was shining. The camera is tripod mounted and operated by a remote in mirror lock up mode to avoid any unnecessary vibrations spoiling the sharpness.
I won't bore you any further with landscape techniques other than to say the image was shot in RAW mode, processed to a 16bit Tiff in Capture One. PS CS2 was used to make an image suitable for web viewing and an A3+ size print.
I choose my spot down by the stream with some foreground rocks, one echoing the shape of Glamaig. The bridge has three arches, but I only included two in the frame, the mountain making the third to keep a balanced composition.
Thanks for viewing and any comments you make.
Richard.
Comments (52)
FrenchKiss
This is just gorgeous and I found the techniques you used absolutely fascinating. Thanks so much for sharing all you did to take this picture. It's really beautiful.
TwoPynts
Lots of great info about how this winner of a landscape photo came into being. Congrats on the win -- I voted for ya! ;']
blankfrancine
Beautiful image.
thefixer
Wow! that's one amazing photo, looks like a painting, you are obviously very adept at what you do! Excellent!!
hairyface
Congratulations, this is a cracking image!
athesdan
superb shot
MrsLubner
A stellar shot with a magnificent view of so many interesting things. Your skill is showing... :-)
mark.spooner
A lovely capture, very vivid!
marybelgium
very well done !
Laelia
Excellent light,colors and details kept in the first shot I think The postwork you done is difficult If I may say, hope I won't offense ... the good result makes me thinking at a photography treated like a terragen image Great pic, Richard q:) Magali
aangus
A master at work! Cracking result, and your explanation of your technique is very informative, ty. The annual race up Glamaig was a couple of weeks ago...the winner took 49 minutes up and down! ....how they do it I don't know. It looks like you were lucky with the weather, there's no-where quite like Skye on a day like this. Congratulations on your challenge win...with this picture it would be difficult not to win it, well done.
annie5
Congratulations for this splendid picture! love it :)
jedink
Spectacular image, I can see why you won the genre challenge. Grats mate.
Rob2753
Fantastic shot - lovely colours and lighting !
BibbyBear
Well this is why I didn't win LOL!!! Only joking Richard, this is one amazing capture. The colours, textures and POV are fantastic - the techy info is great (although mostly goes over my head!!) and a stunning composition. This had to be a winner before even entering the challenge. Excellent capture. xx
Chaos911
wonderful warm colours, i like that :)
rainbows
So much beauty to behold, Richard, A sublime capture, I loved my visit to Skye!!!! I got chased by a bull!!!! Hugs. Diane.
bentchick
Wow! A masterpiece! Wonderful compo and color!
vlaaitje
how wonderful is this, such a romantic view...love the rocks as well....gorgeous texture on the bridge....wish I was there and just smell the air
aljaysart
That is one hell of an awesome and a beatuful capture.....
danob
Fine work Richard and a worthy winner
JuliusS-J
Wonderfull photo and congratulation, it's a real masterpiece!
Valerie-Ducom
Wowwww, you're a champion my friend !!! Excellent landscape ! Good day :)
erskogly
All that filter stacking obviously paid off bigtime - gorgeous capture!
Dianthus
Brilliant:)
tommorules
Not sure what competition you're talking about as I'm still not that familiar with this site, but this is a damn fine shot & by the sounds of your technique a pure one too. I would not have said this looked like an HDR shot, even if you'd not mentioned it, in fact this reminds me of a certain Mr Charlie Waite, which is probably the highest praise I can give you. Many congrats on the win & may I please apply for the job of sherpa to carry all your gear when you turn pro. My cut 40%. OK 30%..... 10...? Alright 5% and danger money. In all seriousness, the only worry this gives me, is, if you can stack so much glass on front of your camera and come up with this quality, why am I buying hoya-super-duper-pro filters at 3 times the price when I needn't bother? Always a pleasure to view your posts Richard. Regards.
LouLouBell
Wow, love the soft water and striking angles, great shot!!
Punaguy
Well ya certainly nailed this one down. Brilliant calculations and the results are startling. You really have to have this wired to pull this one off in broad daylight...Great POV and well excecuted shot!! Aloha~
DELMUR
superb image!
sharky_
A most beautiful image. Thanks for sharing your work to make this image at its best, I like it... Excellent.. Aloha