How do you take it?

[sabrina860]

So i tried to shoot a waterfall at a slow shutter and it came out overexposed. I closed the aperture and lowered the iso and it still didn't come out right. I tried this during the day if that matters. How do you all capture the effect of blurred streaming water?

[RLucas]

You may want to try a ND (neutral density) filter. It lets all the color through, but cuts the light. You can buy them to cut out various stops of light.

[RichardTaylor]

Re the ND
+1

or you may like to try shooting at a different time of day or in different weather conditions.

Here is an example shot at 1 second. Clear blue sky with puffy clouds however the waterfall was under the forest canopy. I did not use a ND filter. It has had a fair amount of PPing from the original RAW file.


Camera Canon EOS 5D
Exposure 1
Aperture f/13.0
Focal Length 200 mm
ISO Speed 400
Exposure Bias 0 EV

[RecurrentNerve]

Checklist: ND filter or in a pinch, a polariser; the lowest ISO your camera will set; a small aperture.

[narmi]

Originally Posted by sabrina860

So i tried to shoot a waterfall at a slow shutter and it came out overexposed. I closed the aperture and lowered the iso and it still didn't come out right. I tried this during the day if that matters. How do you all capture the effect of blurred streaming water?

lucas is right you have to use ND filter , here what it do , when you use ND filter it cut down the light coming to your cam sensor so you can use low shutter speed which will capture water fall in a flow like you won't see any water but fast flow water fall
you might need tripod also if you are in less light

you can still get the effect by trying this: put your camera on a tripod, go to aperture priority mode, and set your aperture to the biggest number your lens will allow (probably either f/22 or f/36). This leaves your shutter open longer than usual (but that's okay, you're in deep shade, right?), and you'll get that same silky-looking water.

[klorptar]

Originally Posted by sabrina860

So i tried to shoot a waterfall at a slow shutter and it came out overexposed. I closed the aperture and lowered the iso and it still didn't come out right. I tried this during the day if that matters. How do you all capture the effect of blurred streaming water?

The ND filters work really well. If you don't have a filter, or are too impatient to find one, you can simply shoot when there's less ambient light. Also, I shoot mostly in RAW format and use photoshop cs5 for post-processing. It feels a little like cheating, but I have been able to save a lot of shots that were over or under exposed.

[meganea84]

I got this shot
Exposure 0.2 sec (1/5)
Aperture f/22.0
Focal Length 50 mm
ISO Speed 200

I used my 50mm no polarizer, a tripod, and just a little bit of Photoshop. Really lighting and the time of the day and what the lighting is when you take it helps A LOT. On my 50mm I don't have a polarizer but on my 75 to 300 I do.