Going to Iceland, camera equipment questions and waterfall shooting suggestions.

[eddieg07410]

I will be going to Iceland at the beginning of August on a cruise. Will take my Fuji xt-3 with the 70-300mm lens with 1.4 teleconverter, Viltrlox 13mm,  and Viltrox 1.2 27. mm lens. I will also have a ND and a polarizing filters, and a monopod o double as a walking stick. As these are mostly cruise excursions I will not have much time to setup and shoot. I expect to shoot some street photography, waterfalls nd other landscapes, puffin, and people. I welcome all suggestions and advice for setting up for this pictures with my equipment, including is, f stops, and shutter speeds, as well as which filters to use when. Thanks in advance for your response.

[pengu1n]

Set up situations that simulate what you want to shoot and practice. You need to know how to quickly get your camera set up for the shooting situation. If your camera has custom settings, set one up for street shooting, one for waterfalls, etc. Look for videos on youtube that give suggestions.

[pierces]

It looks like you have most of the bases covered as far as equipment. We did Ireland/Iceland back in 2019 and I carried about the same lens range. 

 

I shoot aperture mode nearly all the time and adjust the f-stop for dept of field control. Simplifies the shooting since the camera takes care of the shutter speed and ISO. I limit both the minimum shutter speed and ISO range with shutter minimum set according to activity (1/500 for kids and action and 1/60 or so for landscape). I limit the ISO to 12800 on the A7rV and 3200 on the A6600. I seldom shoot above f/8 unless I'm trying to include some sort of foreground detail or want a sunstar in the shot. I use wide angle (less than 24mm) mostly for indoor and rely on stitched panoramas for wide landscapes to control distortion. The exception is the aforementioned inclusion of foreground where wide angle lenses are great.

 

Here's a link to the photos. There's a button at the bottom of the image pages to pop up the image settings, etc..

 

https://pptphoto.com/albums/Travel/Cruising/2019 Ireland %26 Iceland/index.html

 

Stitched panorama:

 

 

Dave

[eddieg07410]

1 hour ago, pierces said:

It looks like you have most of the bases covered as far as equipment. We did Ireland/Iceland back in 2019 and I carried about the same lens range. 

 

I shoot aperture mode nearly all the time and adjust the f-stop for dept of field control. Simplifies the shooting since the camera takes care of the shutter speed and ISO. I limit both the minimum shutter speed and ISO range with shutter minimum set according to activity (1/500 for kids and action and 1/60 or so for landscape). I limit the ISO to 12800 on the A7rV and 3200 on the A6600. I seldom shoot above f/8 unless I'm trying to include some sort of foreground detail or want a sunstar in the shot. I use wide angle (less than 24mm) mostly for indoor and rely on stitched panoramas for wide landscapes to control distortion. The exception is the aforementioned inclusion of foreground where wide angle lenses are great.

 

Here's a link to the photos. There's a button at the bottom of the image pages to pop up the image settings, etc..

 

https://pptphoto.com/albums/Travel/Cruising/2019 Ireland %26 Iceland/index.html

 

Stitched panorama:

 

 

Dave

Really nice picture. What exposure was used? f stop and shutter speed?

[pierces]

5 minutes ago, eddieg07410 said:

Really nice picture. What exposure was used? f stop and shutter speed?

 

Fortunately, Lightroom retains the settings when it stitches a panorama.

 

 

Dave

[Mr. Click]

Heading to Iceland in a few weeks with my Sony A6400 and the 18-200mm and a GoPro for those super wide moments.  For water falls I usually like to slow my shutter down to get some movement in the water to show up.  Like Dave, I pretty much live on Aperture and use f stops and ISO to create the shutter speed I want.  We were supposed to go pre covid but that got lost to the pandemic so I am really looking forward to make this trip all about pictures starting with the waterfalls and hoping to maybe even bet a lova lfowling image. 

[eddieg07410]

21 hours ago, Mr. Click said:

Heading to Iceland in a few weeks with my Sony A6400 and the 18-200mm and a GoPro for those super wide moments.  For water falls I usually like to slow my shutter down to get some movement in the water to show up.  Like Dave, I pretty much live on Aperture and use f stops and ISO to create the shutter speed I want.  We were supposed to go pre covid but that got lost to the pandemic so I am really looking forward to make this trip all about pictures starting with the waterfalls and hoping to maybe even bet a lova lfowling image. 

Do you use  neutral density filter to slow shutter speed. What shutter speed do you like to shoot waterfalls at?

[pierces]

Jumping in for an opinion. 

 

Streams and delicate waterfalls do well with long exposures to "cottonize" them. I shot this at f/14 with a 1.0s exposure (handheld with lens and in-body stabilization after three tries). It was in a shaded area, and I wouldn't have been able to get to 1.0s without an ND filter (which I seldom carry). 

 

Again, just my opinion, but the grand cataracts like Gullfoss and Godafoss are better represented by stopping the fall of water so the sheer mass and power can be seen. 

 

People see things differently and photographic "rules" are nothing if not flexible, but I thought I would share my view on this.

 

Dave

[Mr. Click]

2 hours ago, eddieg07410 said:

Do you use  neutral density filter to slow shutter speed. What shutter speed do you like to shoot waterfalls at?

Lots of people do but I don't. Just my preference.  As Dave says below a lot depends how much motion or silky look you want in the water.  Since I rarely carry a tripod anymore my slowest speeds are 1/4 sec unless I can brace on a tree or a railing.  Between lowering my ISO to 100 and dropping the aperture to 22 or smaller it is pretty easy to get down to  that 1/4 second. If you want to go lower then you really do need a tripod and an ND filter.