[py6km]

About 8.30pm last night I happened to look outside and notice that the sky was looking pretty nice, so, as I was bored I decided to nip out and see if there were any good shots to be had; would give me chance to test out my new tripod and head as well. Unfortunately, 'nipping' out in Bristol is a bit of misnomer - it's the worst for traffic at just about any time, coupled with the fact that the area that I live in has virtually zero photogenic bits, so I had to go out in the car. I headed out towards Clifton and the suspension bridge thinking that a sunset behind the bridge would be nice. Ok, so that would have been possible if a) there weren't so many damned trees all around the bridge now, and b) the sun was setting on the other side of the planet. I think I could have got a nice photo then from where I was

So, went up onto Clifton Downs, but couldn't see anything that really took my fancy. Then headed through the centre of the city. Just as I was about to give up, I saw that the sky had changed, in the space of about 2 minutes, to a beautiful orange and golden colour, and that the clouds were spectacular for photos. So I hot-footed it back up to the Downs and manged to get this. It's not an outstanding shot by any stretch, but just look at the sky - how lovely is that ! I wish I could have spent more time, and have had a nicer location in mind from the outset. I'm sure someone more accomplished could have done a far better job.

This brings me to a question, if you're still with me.

I took three bracketed exposures, and this is the result of two of them merged in Photoshop as I'd effectively exposed for the sky (in fact I should have taken more as -2eV, 0 and 2eV didn't really give enough latitude to get foreground detail out). I tried to use the hyperfocal distance calculator to work out where to manually focus. At the aperture (f/22), and focal length (about 50mm I think) I was at, the calc says focus at a point about 5.87m in front of you so that you can get everything from about 3m to infinity in focus.

Trouble is, my 24-105L (even though it has distance markings) doesn't make it easy to select this kind of figure very accurately, especially since the scale is non-linear. Anything around 1-5m is ok, but after that it really was guesswork to try to and figure out where to manually focus at 5.87m!

How do people deal with this? Am I missing something, or do you adjust your focal length and aperture to get a sensible focus point which you know you'll be able to set manually on the lens rather than the other way around?

[springtide]

What a sky, and I missed it! Great colours!

Been wanting to take a trip out to catch a sunset for ages, but it has been cloudy all day so popped open a bottle of wine early evening.

What a mistake

About the 'hyperfocal' distance setttings, I just guess. Set the aperture and point the camera at what I think the rough distance is. I do get some hunting in very low light, but the focus does usually get a lock so that I can just disable the AF.

ND Grads would have also helped, but you really do seem to need as you stated about 4-6 EV range in exposures.

I think the Sunsets over Bristol are pretty good looking up the river.
Even more gutted as I've just seen that my mate got a cracking shot last night looking up towards the bridge......
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bristol_bound/2548933009/

[py6km]

It was a nice one, yes. Your friend's pic is very nice - I have no idea how to get to the place that was taken, which I think is half the problem ! Perhaps on the Bristol meet we can try and figure out these vantage points.

[springtide]

Originally Posted by py6km

It was a nice one, yes. Your friend's pic is very nice - I have no idea how to get to the place that was taken, which I think is half the problem ! Perhaps on the Bristol meet we can try and figure out these vantage points.

Not a problem at all. I would also like to spending some time walking around that area, since I know bits of it from cycling home from Leigh Woods but there's lots I don't.

Where my mate was standing is pretty easy to find, but a nightmare to work out where to park. Best to look on Google Earth and you'll soon work out where he's standing, but something you really want to check out in advance to find a good spot.

It's also worth looking through "bristol_bounds" Flickr pages, since he's taken lots in Bristol.

[imcarm]

What a lovely sky and very well captured, I also like the reflections captured in the river really leads the eyes up to that colourful sky.

[danburbridge]

that shot you linked to is taken from down by the cumberland basin flyover thing I think - location on google maps is: 51.448177,-2.624102