Okay, so it was 11:06pm ... but that didn't roll off the tongue as nicely. ;-)
Wanted to do something using the first-quarter moon to create a "day at night" scene with the stars visible and that surreal light with deep blue skies. I originally wanted something considerably longer -- like 5-10 minutes -- to get star trails as well, but didn't have the time to fiddle with settings.
Shot on what I think is the 15th hole of the Whirlwind Golf Course at Wild Horse Pass in Arizona, located just southwest of Phoenix. I was facing almost due west. There was little ambient light (it was pitch black actually!) with hardly any light bleed from the nearby city. I wondered onto the green(s) around 10:45pm.
This exposure was "only" 30 seconds; I did several at 1 minute-plus. ISO was raised to 400 to ensure shadow detail even with the relatively short shutter speed under dark skies. Of course, the moon helped and I was counting on that. Had I shot ISO 100 this same shot would probably have been 2min (?).
Increased Exposure and Brightness during RAW conversion (ACR 4.1) as well as tweaking color temp (3300k) and black levels/contrast. Once in PS CS3 I used Curves and Selective Color adjustment layers to futher highlight light and soften shadows. Finished with Noisware NR and smart sharpen.
***post challenge***
Thanks for all the comments and votes!
Statistics
Place: 9 out of 158 Avg (all users): 6.6622 Avg (commenters): 7.8235 Avg (participants): 6.5690 Avg (non-participants): 6.6946 Views since voting: 2540 Views during voting: 370 Votes: 225 Comments: 20 Favorites: 3 (view)
Nice shot, long enough to get the moon burned out but short enough to leave the flag shadow. And breaking the rule of thirds works well here too. nice ballance IMHO.
I love this shot. Could do with a bit of grain reduction but it's beautiful nonetheless. Simplicity for the win!! (for some reason this photo reminds me of a Magritte painting, only without the drugs or surrealism!!)
Add photograph to your favorites
Add photographer to your favorites
Photographer found comment helpful.
