Golden Hour Visions: Wayne I. Henry
My original plan was to shoot East into the sunrise at the site of the Inuksuks in the Ottawa River. I made a trip to scout the site a day before. A good thing I did since the city had installed fencing to keep people from wandering onto the ice. From the vantage point of the walk-way, no aesthetically interesting shots were possible.
So, on to Plan B: shoot in the afternoon Golden Hour in and around Champlain Park. These are the results.
Image 1: Champlain Park just as Golden Hour is ending.
This was the last shot was taken looking West just as Golden Hour was coming to an end. The pink hues begin to emerge in the sky as the sun is about to set.
Image 2: Looking West along NCC trails near Champlain Park.
This was the first shot taken just as Golden Hour was getting under way. The tones are still a bit bluish.
Image 3: Art installation at Island Park.
This one was taken about half-way through Golden Hour looking Eastward. The light is brilliant and directional, but not at all harsh.
Image 4: Along NCC trails looking East towards Tunney's Pasture.
Another shot looking Eastward about 15 minutes before Golden Hour ends.
Image 5: Ottawa River (looking West).
This was shot about 10 minutes before Golden Hour ends, looking West as the sun approaches the horizon.
General Reflections: Golden Hour presents magnificent opportunities for great shots. The light is brilliant but not harsh, so the quality of the illumination is very rich. It's also directional, so it tends to bring out a lot of detail in the subject when captured from the right angle (Image 3 makes this especially evident). And as the sun approaches the horizon, pink hues begin to emerge in the sky making for a very pleasing effect.
One very significant challenge, though, was that there was often a lot of contrast which made it difficult to tell, looking through the viewfinder, what was in focus. Indeed, many of the shots taken were unusable because the intended subject was out of focus.
All of these were shot at ISO 325 and White Balance set to sunning condition, using a Nikon D7100 and a Nikkor 18-140 zoom.
