SONY A7R | Voigtlander 40mm Nokton f1.4 lens | Exposure f22 @ 8 seconds | © James Gray
Luckily for me, a bus drove past during the exposure
SONY A7R | Voigtlander 40mm Nokton f1.4 lens | Exposure f22 @ 8 seconds | © James Gray
A second exposure with more traffic passing. You never know what you’ll get when you shoot long exposures like this.
Taken on a Sony A7R, which was new to me at the time these pictures were taken in Cardiff Bay. I set up my camera onto a sturdy Manfrotto tripod and then just waited for traffic to come through. I set the exposure to be f22 at about 8 seconds to maximise the starlights.
I then post processed in CaptureOne. For the main edit, I decided to get rid of the Sainsbury’s corner shop in the bottom left corner as it didn’t seem to add much to the picture and was more of a distraction. Once I’d cropped that out, I worked through the tabs gradually reducing the colour of the sky and lightning the image to add more interest and let the starlights from the lamppost in the centre and at the back, come to life.
one advantage of working with such a small aperture (f22) is that you can see the individual lens blades. The lens I used here was a Nokton f1.4 from Voigtlander, paired with a Sony A7R was great for landscape work, especially when using a tripod, as you’ve more time to get the focus right. The Voigtlander is a completely manual lens, no autofocus here..! Old school, but works a treat when you take your time.
Editing this in Capture One to get the final images at the top…
