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It was early yesterday evening (around 7PM) when I looked to the skies and notices a nice array of clouds which could make for some interesting sunset and twilight photos.

As I'd been trying out a number of iPhone applications specifically built for photographers, and more specifically ones which allowed you to research and prepare to photograph a landscape with specific lighting or placement of the sun or moon in the scene I whipped out LightTrac and moved the source location around the north side of Sydney harbour looking for a suitable place relative to the location and path of the setting sun.

I opted to head to the end of the Longueville peninsula (Aquatic Park - opposite Woolwich) where the sun could set over Woolwich and the bay.

As always I'd love to hear any feedback, comments, suggestions or critique...

I arrived pretty much as the sun was setting over and behind the Woolwich peninsula so I didn't have a moment to spare. I setup my tripod on the cliffs above the water and took a few shots using the 50mm lens I had on the camera as the sun quickly set over the horizon. The following was taken at 7:59PM.


NIKON D90 + 50.0 mm f/1.4 @ 50 mm, 1/125 sec at f / 13, ISO 200

Once the sun had actually moved over the horizon I moved down to the waters edge and setup a number of different shots looking across the bay from a fairly low angle. I switched to my ultra wide angle lens and set to 8mm I moved in close.

8:05PM and I've setup just behind and on a large rock at the waters edge.


NIKON D90 + 8.0-16.0 mm f/4.5-5.6 @ 8 mm, 1/10 sec at f / 9, ISO 200

8:26PM and we are nearing the end of twilight. It's actually quite dark by now and the rock I'd placed as foreground interest at the waters edge is essentially a silhouette - I figured I'd try my hand lighting it using my Nikon SB-600 flash to see how that would look - I handheld the flash and used the camera in commander mode to trigger the remote flash only in rear curtain sync.


NIKON D90 + 8.0-16.0 mm f/4.5-5.6 @ 8 mm, 0.8 sec at f / 13, ISO 200

This last was taken almost at the end of twilight at 8:33PM.


NIKON D90 + 8.0-16.0 mm f/4.5-5.6 @ 8 mm, 5 sec at f / 11, ISO 200

Hey Rodney,
Great to meet you the other night.
The first and second definately have appeal, nice liight.
I do not like the artificially lit rocks in the foreground of the last . Just looks odd to me.
Were the boats rocking? It looks like you may need to do a bit to "defish" a couple of these.
Always good to get out of your comfort zone.

The first image is one that I get drawn to most - the others feel like compromise between the sky and teh foreground that just did not make it, maybe just concentrating on one aspect and making that the primary target would help, ie get the colours from the sun and clouds.

The first would be a good HDR candidate also, however I reckon that with alot of my shots and they turn out shite...

I would have pushed for the small aperture and long shutter for the last 3, getting that slight movement in the clouds can bring some really drama to a scene, don't be afraid to go to f22.

To add to others' comments rather than repeating them.

It may be that you need to use a slightly longer focal length here. [Or larger prints perhaps] I think the wide lens is taking the subject too far in some ways. The color isn't that strong so that isn't standing out much etc. Hence some pano style crops maybe in order...

Did you miss the best light as I'd expect this sunset to be more colorful? [I saw this light yesterday but it was kind of too late to get anywhere....] BTW these shots with boats are tough as it limits your shutter quite alot due to bobbing and blurring.

Nice work in researching the area with the apps before getting there. I use the desktop version of the ephemeris quite a lot.
Also pocket weather has sunrise and sunset times, Hurley surf has tide times.

Skippy cloud attempts to predict cloud cover ...

colin_12 wrote:Great to meet you the other night.
The first and second definately have appeal, nice liight.
I do not like the artificially lit rocks in the foreground of the last . Just looks odd to me.
Were the boats rocking?

Thanks - and great to meet all of you

Yeah - I wasn't really sure how the flash painted rocks were going to go (it's just they looked so black on the LCD so I figured I'd try something) and I had no real idea how much light the flash was going to create - my real concern was the flash doesn't have a particularly wide spread and I'm using an 8mm lens. I do have some shots taken around the same time without the flash but none I've done any processing to... and yes the boats were rocking and moving - but I believe the bent out masts is more from the 8mm distortion

biggerry wrote:The first would be a good HDR candidate also.

I did take a bracketed sequence of one like the first - just havn't gotten around to processing it yet - if I do and it doesn't turn out to be a disaster I'll post it up

biggerry wrote:I would have pushed for the small aperture and long shutter for the last 3, getting that slight movement in the clouds can bring some really drama to a scene, don't be afraid to go to f22.

I do have some 20 to 25 second exposures similar to the last image but whilst the water was more misty/glassy the clouds really didn't do anything interesting other than turn to grey mush

Thanks for the tip on f22 - I'd always been concerned with going over f16 (diffraction) - you reckon the result outweighs any potential downsides?

surenj wrote:It may be that you need to use a slightly longer focal length here.

When I looked on the computer I felt the same thing - maybe thats why I need that sharper 17-50odd lens (I do hope you tell me how your Tamron 17-50/2.8 goes) and the ability then to get/use CPL's and ND Grads - which are essentially impossible with my 8-16mm.

surenj wrote:Did you miss the best light as I'd expect this sunset to be more colorful?

I'm not sure and I would have thought so too - I was there from basically a few mins before the sun went over the horizon till the end of twilight and the clouds basically never got any colour at all - perhaps the best colour if it happened was well before sunset?

I probably need a bit better lead time next time - rather than deciding to go somewhere 30 mins before sunset

Here is one of the longer shutter versions...

Which I also pano cropped and I believe I might have also found at least some of the colour for all the images - oops - I'd left all the shots in Camera AutoWB which had selected a nice cool temp - I selected Cloudy and low and behold...


NIKON D90 + 8.0-16.0 mm f/4.5-5.6 @ 8 mm, 20 sec at f / 11, ISO 200

I've adjusted the temp of the original images and pano cropped all three of the horizontal ones which I think does make them look better - I'll upload in a day or two.

This has better colour but I see what you mean about the boats moving.

Remorhaz wrote:(I do hope you tell me how your Tamron 17-50/2.8 goes)

At the stopped down apertures you are using, any lens would do. You could easily use a kit lens or below.  PS: The Tamron has quite nicely replaced my 17-85 which has sadly broken down.

surenj wrote:

Remorhaz wrote:(I do hope you tell me how your Tamron 17-50/2.8 goes)

At the stopped down apertures you are using, any lens would do. You could easily use a kit lens or below.  PS: The Tamron has quite nicely replaced my 17-85 which has sadly broken down.

yes - however my query is more for use in low light indoors photography (e.g. school performances) where I'm shooting at 2.8 and not wanting terminator focus hunting...