It’s not easy to find a venue where the light direction changes significantly at this time of year. The River Esk runs South > North through town, so most buildings face either East or West. At this time of year, the sun rises in the SSE and sets in the SSW, so the light direction is virtually from the South during the short day.
The first building I’ve used is the Engine Shed at the North Yorkshire Moors Railway. For this shoot I used my D200 fitted with a Sigma 10 – 20 mm lens and my D300s with the 18 – 200 mm lens. I was accompanied by one of the engineers throughout the visit, to make sure I didn’t wander into any dangerous situations (there was a heavy lift ongoing to remove an engine boiler for its 10 yearly inspection and certification). I was most grateful for his time and patience.
The main door faces South - this shaft of light catching the side of the engine was the only direct sunlight I was going to get. The relative brightness of this area of light has caused the rest of the building to be underexposed, so little to see in the shadows. This is taken from the side of the doorway, so the light is behind me.
Shooting into the light has produced a much more atmospheric image with more contrast. The reflections of light in the pools of oil and grease and the increased detail in the engine make a slightly better image. Steam from the crane (even the crane is steam operated, with its own coal fired boiler and reciprocating engine driven winch) in the doorway helps to accentuate the shafts of sunlight and reduces the impact of the lifting operation in the doorway.
As the area lit by the direct sunlight decreased, the exposure time increased and allowed detail in the rest of the building to come through. Taken from the same position as the first image, we can now see that there’s another engine in the shed. We can also see that the overhead sodium lights are becoming more prominent.
Shooting into the light still produces a very contrasty image, but we’re seeing more detail now.
This image was mistakenly exposed for the overhead lights, resulting in an underexposed photograph.
Moving further into the building where there is less influence from the doorway lighting, the exposure time increases with a corresponding increase in detail on the steam engine. Indirect sunlight, from the side windows still produces a relatively contrasty image.
Moving to the side of the building, so that the light from the side windows has a less direct impact on the image, the lighting looks much softer. The glare from the windows is less and the hard reflections on the boiler have disappeared.
The red lines to the left are from the jacket of a passing worker – nothing to do with the light, but lots to do with the long shutter speed.
Using the other camera and lens combination, the window lights have been completely removed from the composition. There is some light showing down the side of the engine, but not enough to really affect the overall contrast of the image. The detail seen in this image is better than any from the previous ones. Whether this is better for the building shots is debatable – it could be that a more atmospheric / contrasty image was required.
For the second venue I’ve used Crystal Café at the Whitby Pavilion complex. This is a much underused facility, mainly because of poor management. It’s been council run for many years, but the complex has recently been taken over as a franchise. It took several weeks for my application to photograph to be accepted, but I thought it was worth the effort. It’s got the same problem as most of the properties in Whitby in that it doesn’t face South! This is probably worse as it sits part way down the cliff, facing due North. In the summer months it’s excellent as the café windows catch the early morning sun and then the setting sun, but just now it’s in perpetual shade.
As I was going to have time to change lenses, I took the D300s with 10 – 20 mm and 18 – 200 mm lenses. I didn’t want to use any flash or additional lighting for this exercise and I wanted to use a small aperture throughout the shoot, so I set the ISO to 800 and left it there for the whole time. The exercise was shot over two consecutive days – the first with heavily overcast skies, turning to rain (again) and the second with bright sunlight and light cloud. The café’s opening hours were 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. but at this time of year that was adequate for my needs.
The first image was taken at 10 a.m. on the overcast morning:
01 Day 1 10.00 a.m. Reference image
10 mm (15 mm EFL), f/22, 1/6 sec. Because of the darkness of the day, the orange lights for the sails were on.
02 Day 1 10.00 a.m
18 mm (27 mm EFL), f/22, 1/13 sec. The orange lighting is quite pronounced here.
03 Day 1 1.00 p.m.
18 mm (27 mm EFL), f/22, 1/13 sec. Very little has changed here w.r.t. light strength or quality. The sky has become slightly darker, but the compensation made by the camera has resulted in almost the same image lighting. Note the reflections in the mirror tiles above the bar – almost imperceptible here, but those change with the light.
04 Day 1 1.00 p.m.
18 mm (27 mm EFL), f/22, 1/25 sec. As with the previous image, there’s very little difference to the earlier shot, except maybe an overall darker portrayal of the seating area, even though the exposure time has increased slightly.
05 Day 1 1.00 p.m.
10 mm (15 mm EFL), f/22, 1/13 sec. This image takes in more of the sky and shows more of the sails. An advantage of this is that the dark sky avoids highlight clipping, but it’s not a very exciting picture.
06 Day 1 3.00 p.m.
18 mm (27 mm EFL), f/22, 1 sec. It’s now got very dark outside and the camera has overcompensated, so that the whole area looks lighter
07 Day 1 3.00 p.m.
22 mm (33 mm EFL), f/22, 0.6 sec. As the outside light fades, the internal light has more effect. Here the lightness of the sails is quite close to the lightness of the clouds – not as I’d have expected, because I perceived that it looked really dark outside – it was raining at this point.
08 Day 1 3.15 p.m
10 mm (15 mm EFL), f/22, 0.6 sec. The light is now fading quite fast and the camera has adjusted for the internal lights, causing the white balance to overcompensate so that the outside light is getting very blue.
09 Day 1 3.30 p.m.
18 mm (27 mm EFL), f/22, 1/13 sec. Further loss of outside light makes the interior look much ‘warmer’ and the white balance compensation causes the outside to look still bluer. I do like the way the complementary colours are working here.
10 Day 1 3.30 p.m.
135 mm (202 mm EFL), f/22, 1/2 sec. As the light decreases the effects of the bar mirrors make the reflections much more pronounced. What blended in previously now demands the attention.
11 Day 1 4.00 pm
18 mm (27 mm EFL), f/22, 1.6 sec. Dusk and it’s time for me to leave. The effects of the automatic White Balance have changed the outside light so that the blue is really unnatural, but not unpleasant to me. I like the complementary colours even more here. What a shame they’re closing!
12 Day 2 10.15 a.m.
10 mm (15 mm EFL), f/22, 1/13 sec. A new day with very little cloud cover. The café is still in the shade, but the brightness from outside means that the internal lights over the seating area are not required. The whites are now much whiter. It’s a cleaner light, but not as appealing for a place to relax.
13 Day 2 1.10 p.m.
18 mm (27 mm EFL), f/22, 1/30 sec. As the sun moves further behind the complex the amount of light diminishes making the area generally darker. The quality of light hasn’t changed significantly over the past 3 hours.
14 Day 2 1.10 p.m.
18 mm (27 mm EFL), f/22, 1/40 sec. The equivalent image from the previous day (05 Day 1 1.00 p.m.) was quite flat. This has more life, but the warmth of the outside light has made the inside look cool. There’s a small ray of sunlight hitting the beam above the diners which gives an indication of the potential light available in the summer months.
Certainly at this time of year it’s not the best time of day to photograph this area.
15 Day 2 1.20 p.m.
10 mm (15 mm EFL), f/22, 1/20 sec The low sunlight striking the top of the atrium roof draws the eye up to the spaceship like structure
16 Day 2 3.45 p.m.
10 mm (15 mm EFL), f/22, 0.6 sec The outside light has reduced as dusk approaches – still not as dark as the previous day, but enough to require the inside sail lights. I really like this mix of lighting. It’s inviting and still has the promise of a lovely place to sit and watch what’s going on outside – what a shame it’s nearly closing time again!
17 Day 2 3.45 p.m.
18 mm (27 mm EFL), f/22, 1/4 sec The sails and discs look really well here, against a cloudless evening sky. I think this is the best combination of lighting for portraying the café at its most appealing.
18 Day 2 3.50 p.m.
10 mm (15 mm EFL), f/22, 0.6 sec A jaunty shooting angle – the warmth and colours of the place under these lighting conditions make you want to play!
19 Day 2 5.00 p.m.
46 mm (69 mm EFL), f/22, 1/2 secThe internal lighting accentuates these discs under the right outside lighting conditions – much more than the previous evening when it was darker outside.
The first venue in this exercise has shown that the direction and strength of the light can change the outlook of the building interior and that moving around within it in differing lighting conditions can produce very different images with alternative contrast and detail. It’s also worth noting that a highly detailed image doesn’t necessarily portray a building in its best light (excuse the pun!).
The second venue has shown that direct sunlight isn’t a requisite for good lighting conditions. It’s also shown that different parts of a space can have much different strengths as the lighting conditions change. It’s worth checking out a building in different lighting conditions before planning a shoot, and possibly discussing the requirements for the shoot before deciding when to execute the plan.
Many of the images could have benefitted from alterations in exposure, white balance and selective colour adjustments, but I’ve deliberately left them as shot, to show how they’re seen in camera. More significantly, I’m sure the use of HDR in many of the images could have improved their appearance immensely.
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