Inspiring Photo: Perfection of the Morning #14412265

Perfection of the Morning

Uploaded: March 19, 2014

Description

Exif: F Number: 8, Exposure Bias Value: 0.00, ExposureTime: 1/10 seconds, Flash: did not fire, compulsory flash mode, ISO: 125, White balance: Manual white balance, FocalLength: 16.00 mm, Model: Canon EOS 7D

Comments

Dale Hardin March 19, 2014

I think it is so cool that you hunted all over for a fence line to lead the eye into this sunrise with it's fantastic colors. Love your dedication. :o) #1567302

Stephen Shoff March 19, 2014

Don't know how much hunting you had to do, Kristin, but what you found certainly works well.

I don't post this kind of sunset picture often because I can't manage the highlights as well as you've done here. Even so, if there's any opportunity to recover any texture in near-white yellow area or the broad expanse of featureless coral in the upper right you might give that a try.

If you applied any vibrance or saturation adjustments, you might try backing that off just a little in the snow and see how you like it. To me it seems a little too strong. #11004138

Kristin Duff March 19, 2014

Dale, this scene presented itself to me one morning as I was out hunting for snowy owls…We have some amazing sunrises and sets to the east of Calgary. Stephen, this was right out of the camera- I wish I had shot it in RAW to be able to recover some of the highlights but because I was looking for birds my camera was set on JPEG. #11004163

Jeff E Jensen March 19, 2014

Great to see you again, Kristin!

I agree with both comments, this is fantastic! Stephen's suggestions are valid and even though you shot in jpeg, you can probably still pull back a little detail. Even if you can't, this is pretty fantastic. #11004184

Beth Spencer March 19, 2014

Kristen what a Beautiful shot, love the colors. If you have photoshop you can open it as a RAW file and try some of the suggestions!! Did you find the owls? #11004188

Kristin Duff March 19, 2014

…found the owls, no to photo shop #11004191

Kristin Duff March 19, 2014

…found the owls and no to photoshop #11004192

Kristin Duff March 19, 2014

…sorry, had trouble getting this shot up…found the owls much later in the day #11004195

Stephen Shoff March 19, 2014

I'm curious. Why do you feel a need to shoot your bird pictures in JPG?

I know it costs me disk space and file management overhead, but I record all my images in both formats. Generally, I work the RAW and use the JPG for reference. Occasionally, I use the JPG for on-the-road convenience or as a reference to keep from going overboard in post-processing. #11004241

Kristin Duff March 20, 2014

Stephen, RAW files take much longer to write than jpeg, and when you are shooting birds in flight milliseconds count. #11004437

Dale Hardin March 20, 2014

Kristin, shutter speed is the same for both, so milliseconds have no bearing on the image unless you are shooting in burst and even then should not have an effect unless you have a very small buffer. #11004454

Kristin Duff March 20, 2014

it has been my experience that there is a lag between shooting and writing, so when I shoot BIF, I shoot jpeg #11004468

Jeff E Jensen March 20, 2014

Well, let me throw my $0.02 in. It is the buffer that will cause the lag and slow the shutter down. If you look at a couple of examples, the Canon 60D buffer will handle 15 RAW or 34 large jpeg images and the Canon 1Dx will handle 31 RAW and 56 jpeg. The 60D tops out at just a hair over 5 fps and the 1Dx does 12 (14 in certain situations). So, either way, your going to fill the buffer in about 3 seconds either way in RAW, 6 in jpeg. The other thing that can make a difference is the speed of the memory card you are using. Slow cards will slow things down, especially when shooting RAW.

By comparison, Dale's a77 buffer will handle 15 RAW or 19 jpegs before filling the buffer. At just a hair under 8 fps, he's going to fill the buffer in just under 2 secs in RAW and about 2.5 secs in jpeg. Again, a slower card will slow it down even more. #11004487

Peter W. Marks March 20, 2014

Nature at its best; beautiful colours Kristin. #11004594

Kristin Duff March 20, 2014

thanks Peter #11004598

Stephen Shoff March 20, 2014

Thank you, Kristin, for your response. That's the technical reason I would have expected for shooting in JPG only.

I'm not such an avid bird photographer that I shoot extended bursts of frames and I use high-speed CF cards. So buffer size doesn't slow me down. If it did, I would probably experiment with turning off the JPG before turning off the RAW.

In Jeff's comment, I would clarify that buffer contention doesn't slow down shutter speed, it slows down frame rate, and that not until the buffer fills.
#11004736

Jeff E Jensen March 20, 2014

Yup, you are correct, Stephen. It would slow down the frame rate. #11004743

Kristin Duff March 20, 2014

Jeff, I have no idea what you just said…did I ever mention I failed university math 3 x! Any way I am shooting with a 7D and I think it does 8 frames per second. whenI shoot in RAW or RAW/JPEG the time I actually can view what I just shot takes a long time…is that what you call the buffer? #11004748

Jeff E Jensen March 20, 2014

Kristin - the buffer is the internal memory space that fills up as the camera is shooting multiple shots and writing them to the card. When shooting one shot at time, the camera doesn't have a problem keeping up with writing to the card. When shooting multiple shots, the camera can't write to the card fast enough to keep up with the frame rate, so it has the buffer built in to help minimize the lag and the buffer will fill up.

On the 7D, you can shoot 40 large jpegs, or 22 raw images before the buffer fills. in jpeg mode, it will take 5 seconds to clear the buffer and view images. in RAW, about ll seconds. Yes, your 7D gets you 8 frames per second, so in jpeg, you can fire for about 5 seconds before you've maxed out your buffer and have to wait for it to clear.

#11004754

Kristin Duff March 20, 2014

Thank you Jeff..I knew that I was just testing you. JUST kidding…lol…thanks for the info Jeff I mean it! #11004756

Stephen Shoff March 20, 2014

so to put all this technical discussion into the context of the "I wish I had shot it in RAW" comment...

Are you shooting bursts of more than about 20 images at a time? If not, then that lag you are experiencing is not an indication that shooting in RAW would cause you to miss BIF shots. That lag is only the wait time you experience viewing the images AFTER YOU HAVE STOPPED taking pictures.

If, on the other hand, you take bursts of more than 20 images AND about 5 seconds into the burst you audibly detect a slowdown in the rate at which the shutter is firing, then you really would be constrained by the buffer (or your card speed) if you were shooting in RAW, and even more so if you were shooting in RAW+JPG. #11004815

Kalena Randall March 21, 2014

Kristin,

I'm very partial to sunrises and sunsets. I like the leading line of the fence in your photo healing toward the brightest part of the light.

I think I might have tried to bring up the shadows just a tad on the closest fence posts just to see how it looked.

As far as the JPEG versus raw, a faster card helps. I often shoot equestrian hunter jumper events for my riding instructor. I went to a faster card and it made a huge difference. I didn't step up the pro level card because I only had so much extra cash to spend. I hope to do that soon.

#11005533

Michael Kelly March 22, 2014

Beautiful colors in the sunrise and I love the tinted snow. A bit of recovery will only help this great shot, but it is fine as shown so not a big deal if you can not.

I shoot birds a lot and only use RAW. The technical discussions are correct but the reality is that I find I don't experience any problems with RAW being fast enough. I very seldome shoot burst to the buiffer limit and have upper end cards but not the very top end. #11006090

Rita K. Connell March 23, 2014

Very beautiful Kristen your find was well worth the hunt. Your images are worth selling the different in the price you could get for them is jpeg or raw Higher price raw no lost details or lower price jpeg because of lost details #11006553

Debbie E. Payne March 28, 2014

I love this image, Kristin. You really came home with some great shots. The owl is wonderful as well. The snow might be desaturated just a bit but I would hesitate to take it down too far. I love the vividness I am seeing here and the image of the owl is so nice and crisp. Bet you were cold that morning... #11010130

Kristin Duff March 28, 2014

It has been a very cold morning…-30 but it's warming up now- if it would only stop snowing! #11010279

Kristin Duff April 04, 2014

Thanks BP Editor! much appreciated! #11017284

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