Practice makes Perfect!!!!!

Ok,

They say that practice makes perfect, and I believe that's certainly true with photography.

As well as the light painting, I love to do long exposures, as I have previously stated.

Not a bad morning yesterday (Sunday 4th May) so I decided to pop out to Clydach Gorge, about 10 minutes drive away to try out my new little stopper.....

Lee brought out the "Little Stopper" a couple of months ago and I have used it previously, but practice makes perfect.

Armed with my tripod and camera bag I ventured along the gorge path to one of the waterfall areas.

After taking a couple of shots from the easy point of view I wanted to get some shots from the opposite bank.

To achieve this, it was off with my shoes and socks and wade across the river.... Good job I had my shorts on!!!!!

Below is the contact sheets of the shots I took.

I took a total of 59 shots and finally settled on 6 of them as my favourites.

The first image I decided I like was DSC 7385. This one was taken from the nearside and at a higher level.

Although I do have some foreground interest, the falls are side on and not shown at their best.

 

The shot above is my preferred shot, I love the rock as foreground interest whilst the waterfall in the background is shown off at it's best. My opinion of course.....

 

 

 

The one above is probably my next favourite, however, I do think that the right hand water fall is a little blown out. There is good foreground interest as well as good detail in the water.

 

 

 

Another nice shot is this one with the next waterfall in the foreground, good mid ground detail with the falls in the background, again, maybe the right hand waterfall doesn't have enough detail.

 

 

 

This one is taken from a different angle and has a different boulder in the foreground, I quite like this one, as the boulder has good detail. However, I do think that the pale rocks in the immediate foreground are a little distracting.

 

 

This one has a less messy foreground as it is taken with a different focal length from the image above. The thing that spoils it for me is the plume of spray around the fall, I feel it lacks detail.

 

All in all though not a bad set of images in my opinion, good detail in the river water and the left hand waterfall has good detail.

 

There wasn't much colour cast from the "little Stopper", a six stop filter, so not much adjustment to the colour was needed. The greens of the rocks were this vivid and lush.

 

 

I have definitely improved my photography since the last time I took an image from here (below).....

 

So although they're not perfect, practice certainly ensure improvement.

 

 

Below is one of my first attempts at Clydach falls.

 

 

I think my photography has improved quite a bit........