Seriously, this is a question people often ask me. And there’s not just one answer but in my case it has everything to do with creating a mysterious, surreal atmosphere. About visualizing the invisible. An extended exposure can reveal to the eye what was visible to the mind’s eye only. That’s why I love long exposure photography: I want to reveal what my mind’s eye sees.

Good question. Careful preparation is an important aspect of my photography since also my time is very limited and the nature of long photography is such that every shot matters. What I usually do is scout a location I find particularly interesting by using Google maps and/or Google Earth and just zoom in and look at it from various view points. At the same time I will search the Internet for photos of the environment and I try to find as many photos of a certain object in the area as I can possibly find. But not only photos, I also try to find other information in Wikipedia or any other source of a certain area or building I want to shoot. I also never forget to check the tides if I go out shooting seascapes. The type of location I find particularly interesting is based on my preference on a certain moment, often triggered by a photo I just saw on the Internet or a story I just read, you name it. This type of scouting and preparation usually takes me a few hours, sometimes even a few days but by the time I actually arrive at the location I just know where to go to, where to stand, what the ideal position is.

I know the problem and unfortunately I don’t have any special tricks. It’s all a matter of being accurate and disciplined I’m afraid. And I guess I have the same workflow as any other LE photographer:

That’s a very good question. After you’ve calculated the exposure time I always add 30 to 50% exposure time, even in more stable light conditions. Without getting too technical about this there are some factors you always have to take into account. These are described in one of the tutorials on this website.

There’s not one answer to this, it all depends on the situation, the weather conditions, your personal preference, the type of photography you do and what you have available in terms of equipment at the time you’re shooting. In my case all these factors play a role in my aperture choice. But in general if you’re shooting landscapes you don’t want to have a small depth of field so you should choose a smaller aperture, for example anything higher than f/8. And in fact f/8 in general would give you the best sharpness for almost any lens. The thing is that shooting longer exposures will often require shooting with smaller apertures up to f/22 to increase the exposure time and achieve the effect you had in mind. My best shots have been shot between f/8 and f/16 with exposure times up to 4 minutes. So that’s what I prefer to shoot with and I’m always looking for situations and conditions in which I can shoot with my ideal settings. Shooting at f/22 reveals too much sensor dust and besides that the object itself isn’t as sharp as I would like it to be. Shooting at f/13 or f/16 often give me the perfect balance in sharpness of objects, depth of field and lack of sensor dust and other noise. But I won’t hesitate a moment to shoot at f/22 or for that matter, at f/4.0 if the occasion arises and I won’t have a second chance to shoot it again in more ideal circumstances

I usually prefer to shoot my long exposure seascapes in poor light conditions with a lot of clouds and cloud movement, never with a blue sunny sky. The light is just too bright and it will show in the photos with contrasts that are just too harsh. Besides that I think that shooting under a sky covered with clouds the light is more diffuse and can be controlled better by the photographer. It’s works like a soft-box in studio photography. Very often I shoot close to or around sunset when light is fading fast and I can shoot longer exposures to achieve a more ethereal effect. I never shoot at sunrise although light conditions are comparable to sunset. Why? Because I’m just too lazy to get up early –I love photography, but I love the warmth of my bed in the early morning maybe even more!

This depends on so many things: weather conditions, the type of light, the subject, the angle, the effect you want to achieve, etc. An extreme long exposure of let’s say 3 minutes or longer isn’t necessarily better than a shorter exposure of 45 seconds. But it’s true that a longer exposure, especially when shooting seascapes, will give a more ethereal feel to it. Hard to explain but it just looks and feels more fragile, more surreal. But if you shoot architecture and you want to have those dynamic looking streaks of clouds then very often shorter exposure times varying from 45 seconds to 2 minutes is more than enough and a longer exposure would give a totally different look. And then there’s also the subjective and very personal factor. In my case I prefer to have exposure times of 3 minutes or longer for seascapes or landscapes and exposure times of 45 seconds up to 2 minutes for architecture. You can use my personal preference as a guideline but please do experiment!

Well Mr. X. did you perhaps use a gradient filter or CP filter by any chance? Yes I did, replied Mr. X. So Mr. X., when you took the photo after you’ve rotated your camera 90 degrees to shoot in portrait orientation, did you also rotate your filter? Uhmmmm……… thanks Joel! (Real story!)

Hi J., to be sure I have to take a look at your photo but my guess for now that this is caused by light leakage, either through the filters or more probable, through your viewfinder. Very often this is the cause of this type of magenta/purple coloured stripes or banding in the photo. Next time you go out shooting make sure to cover the viewfinder especially when the sun is shining on the back of the camera! I also would recommend using a lens hood. After I’ve looked at the photos I could see that this was indeed the cause. J. confirmed he didn’t cover the viewfinder and that it was very sunny that day.

Unfortunately it’s a basic and physic rule that noise will increase with longer exposures. There’s a lot of literature on this subject available on the Internet but basically noise will increase in poor light conditions combined with longer exposures. There’s however a difference in how noise is handled by modern DSLR’s when compared with older model DSLR’s: modern DSLR’s simply handle noise better. There are many sites discussing this issue with some great examples and I surely can recommend reading Ken Rockwell’s site on this subject.

Short answer: never.

There are so many manufacturers of ND filters these days and there’s a lot of bad stuff around. The bad stuff is almost always very cheap. The good filters are almost always without an exception more expensive. I can recommend the following two brands: ND filters made by B+W (from Schneider optics and these are the ones I use) or the Lee filters. Singh-Ray also makes some fantastic filters but they are all very expensive. B+W and Lee are great high quality filters and I have shot with both. The difference between B+W and Lee filters is that B+W only have screw-on filters while the Lee filters require a holder that you have to attach to your lens and you basically put the filter into the holder. Some photographers prefer the Lee since you don’t have to screw the filter onto the lens and risk changing the settings. Another difference is that shooting with B+W filters will cause a red cast while shooting with Lee will cause a blue cast. I personally think the blue cast is fantastic, especially when you’re a B&W photographer. Please forget all the other brands, they’re just not good enough for me but if you’d like to have a go at it or even use welding glass for your long exposures: feel free to do so, in fact I have seen some great examples shot with welding glass as a filter.

Well, to start off with: 6 stops filters are not strong enough for real long exposures during daylight. With real long exposures I mean anything longer than 1 minute, but for seascapes I prefer to shoot with exposure times of 3 minutes or longer to achieve the smooth effect in the water. You’d need at least 10 stops to shoot at daytime with longer exposures, but even then you’ll notice that 10 stops is not enough especially when shooting on brighter days. So what I do is often stack filters up to 20 stops (although I wouldn’t recommend shooting with 20 stops). Out of my own experience I’ve found out that stacking filters up to 13 or 15 stops give the best results during daytime with exposure times up to 6 minutes. My recommendation would be to buy another set of ND filters: one 10 stops and one 3 stops so you can vary between 10 and 16 stops with the 6 stops you already have.

You’ll need a good DSLR to start with. Any modern entry level DSLR would do just fine. Make sure it has a Bulb setting to shoot with exposure times longer than 30 seconds, and in the case of any modern DSLR at entry level it will surely have a Bulb setting. A good lens is another important ingredient for shooting good shots. In case you shoot long exposures you will often find you need a good wide-angle lens. Invest in that, it’s worth it. But in general a good photograph is made by a good photographer with a good set of eyes and more importantly with the ability to visualize with the mind’s eye, not by an expensive camera with expensive lenses with a bad photographer behind the viewfinder. Further more you’ll need a remote control with a shutter lock and a good tripod. Now a good tripod is essential if you like to shoot good long exposures in rough weather conditions. Don’t buy a cheap tripod, you will regret it. I like to use a heavy tripod since I often shoot in rough and windy weather conditions. Not ideal for travelling of course but I prefer sharp photos and a sore back and arms to blurry photos and still be in good conditional shape after I shot the blurry photos. Besides that: you don’t want your camera with lens and filter on it to be smacked to the ground and broken in pieces due to a sudden wind gust? It happened to me.

I always opt for longer since I always add 30 to 50% to the calculated exposure time. So the best option for me would be to go for the longer one.

In fact I like overcast and dreary days, but it depends on the type of clouds and cloud movement. I guess you’re referring to a very boring looking sky with no variation in clouds. Well my strategy would be to not shoot any skies, but focus on the water, or better yet: don’t shoot any long exposures at all! But that’s my way of working: if weather conditions aren’t co-operating then I prefer not to do any outdoor shooting at all but do some studio work instead like shooting still life work.