#00226, Albina Storm

Don't you just love those "big skies"?

Liz Poon, Graham Opie and myself were camped at a spot called "The Grandstand", so named because it afforded a magnificent view over Albina Lake. After a photographically fruitless day exploring the lake shores we retired to our camp site, pulled out a bottle of port and settled in to watch the sunset.

There had been some low and dark clouds that killed the light, but before long it became apparent that they were clearing and that the final rays of sun would shoot through under the clouds and create an interesting affect.

The clouds were a great combination of dark blue with orange fringes, also the orange was reflecting in the lake. To increase the contrast and make the scene more dramatic I decided to use a red filter.

A red filter will darken blue more than orange, thereby increasing the contrast in the clouds, but you have to be careful. Because the shadows are also blue they can easily be under exposed. If shadows only form a small part of the image it doesn't really matter, but they form a large part of this photo. To retain detail, I increased the exposure by one stop over and above the normal 3-stop allowance for a red filter.



Albina Lake, Kosciuszko National Park, NSW

Technical: Tachihara 5x4, 90mm Schnieder, 1/2s, f22
Keywords: albina storm skies grandstand lake sunset clouds shadows kosciuszko national park nsw black white landscape mountains kosiusko kosiusco mountians