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Gerry and I returned to Malabar for a sunset and evening session this time. The intent was to shoot sunset and twilight and then some star trails and light painting whilst waiting for the trails to complete.

On the way there it was looking "interesting" with a mass of dark clouds (which basically killed off any hopes of star trails) and well... pouring rain

The clouds were moving over very fast (which was great for some long exposure work) and was mostly moving along the coast.

Thankfully the rain died off just as we arrived at the car park and we had no troubles on the 20 minute walk out to the location. We had pretty good weather for sunset itself with some nice cloud action and great colour in the sky and even some rainbow action (which I unfortunately missed capturing )

Here's a shot setting the scene with Gerry - king of the world



We then settled in for the evening with some steel wool action whilst there was still some light and colour in the sky towards the end of twilight. We had some real issues with the steel wool (Gerry was finding it impossible to light) but we got a few almost decent images...



It started to rain fairly heavily in short bursts as dark rain filled clouds moved overhead - we moved inside the bunker to wait it out each time. The only major problem was all the water on the filters and lens

The real action started once we got the EL Wire out - it was a full moon so we had great ambient light - lighting our fast moving clouds and the general landscape during long exposures, so we didn't have to paint any of the scene with torches

Here's a test shot from inside the bunker with some EL Wire whilst we were waiting for the rain to pass



Each time it stopped we'd go outside and setup some shots and go to work (long four (4) or more minute exposures whilst we'd walk through the scene with EL Wire painting the ground with "fire") and when it rained again we'd retreat back inside to wait it out.

We got about three different compositions done before we called it a night. This first however was the money shot - it looked great straight out of camera and we knew we'd gotten what we came here for (two different takes and these are pretty close to SOOC)...





All in all I'd call it a successful outing and we plan to return again - probably to some of the other buildings on the headland - for some further lightpainting and/or star trails action.

Nice stuff Rodney, how cool is that tripod in teh first

A more suitable ignition source is definitely required, I will ensure i have one for the the next session.

I like your slightly wider view on the steel wool, it has captured the complete scene nicely. The sparks flying thru the roof hole is awesome, could not have nailed that if I tried

I like the inside test shot, it actually looks pretty nice, but definitely head back and clone out those red streaks, mental note: must tape over that little LED.

Looks like some of those raindrops on the filters showed up, its a bit hard to do much about those. The last image is still pretty rocking in my head, I still like it two days later The torch on the roof really adds to the scene, possibly doing a separate frame with just torch light painting would be useful to be able to blend in areas to get light details and add more dynamic range as required.

biggerry wrote:Nice stuff Rodney, how cool is that tripod in teh first

I know - that dude's always in my shot

I like your slightly wider view on the steel wool, it has captured the complete scene nicely. The sparks flying thru the roof hole is awesome, could not have nailed that if I tried

I like the inside test shot, it actually looks pretty nice, but definitely head back and clone out those red streaks, mental note: must tape over that little LED.

Thanks - and yes I was going to tell you that too (esp after seeing the last two shots on my computer). Another suggestion for those last two shots (and others probably don't see it but I do since I was there) is your shadow at the front of the building where you lingered to do the flue fire across the front - it's more distinct in the second shot.

and now with some cloneage...

Looks like some of those raindrops on the filters showed up, its a bit hard to do much about those. The last image is still pretty rocking in my head, I still like it two days later The torch on the roof really adds to the scene, possibly doing a separate frame with just torch light painting would be useful to be able to blend in areas to get light details and add more dynamic range as required.

I did some touchup on my favourite of the last two (I actually have a preferance for our first take than our second - for two reasons - I like the colours in the sky more and your torch in the bunker was brighter and the room lit better in the first. I know you like the streaky cloud movement in the second but... )

Here I've blended some of the second shot (your better blue river) back into the first and fixed some of those extraneous red streaks and did a few more tweaks on the building, the ground and our fiery mist



I even took a look at that shot we did from above the bunker with the moon in the shot and it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be (although this one had the most water droplets by far)

That thing in the middle of the 3rd photo is a bit
of a put off. I would clone/remove the city lights
it gives the impression the city is on fire and is
distracting. The rest are all very good, I feel.

biggerry wrote:A more suitable ignition source is definitely required, I will ensure i have one for the the next session.
I like your slightly wider view on the steel wool, it has captured the complete scene nicely.

One of the not so planned shots - for comparison with the other more traditional shorter exposure steel wool spinning shot. Here's one of the long long exposures I was doing - light painting the building and rocks with the LED torch whilst I was waiting for you to light the steel wool - this was a 240 second exposure and as it happens somewhere near the end of the exposure you also managed to get the wool lit so we get both in one (long exposure, bigstopperesque cloud movement, light paint and the 20 seconds of wool spinning)

nice stuff on the last, i have a similiar one, however I actually blended a light painted version into the steel wool one, looks alright.

Remorhaz wrote:I even took a look at that shot we did from above the bunker with the moon in the shot and it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be (although this one had the most water droplets by far)

that does not look too bad ! add a model as a main anchor point and ya laughing.

Last one is visually appealing. I doubt you need a model there as there is lots of subject material. However, it would be cool to have an element to explain what's going on there. ie the story is missing.

biggerry wrote:nice stuff on the last, i have a similiar one, however I actually blended a light painted version into the steel wool one, looks alright.

Thanks Gerry

Remorhaz wrote:I even took a look at that shot we did from above the bunker with the moon in the shot and it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be (although this one had the most water droplets by far)

that does not look too bad ! add a model as a main anchor point and ya laughing.

- so who was going to be the model - you or me

surenj wrote:Last one is visually appealing. I doubt you need a model there as there is lots of subject material. However, it would be cool to have an element to explain what's going on there. ie the story is missing.

Thanks Suren - um - which "last" one were you referring to (the purple one from above or one of the ones with the steel wool or the last one in the original post with EL wire)?

Remorhaz wrote:which "last" one were you referring t

The last picture you posted with steel wool.