Late October Sunset at Sam’s Throne–03/31/15 Featured Arkansas Photography

Sunset from Sam’s Throne in the Arkansas Ozark mountains

Taken with a Phase One IQ180 and  Arca rm3di with Schneider 43mmSK lens, iso 100 @ 1/125th and F11. This was a interesting evening as there was a wedding going on at the same time.  I was pretty amazed to see anyone trying to get married in a wind that was blowing as much as 30 mph at times.  I kept trying to move to stay out of their way, however they wanted the bride and groom to stand where they could be in the sunset.  Oh well, I am sure they don’t remember me with good feelings.  Something to remember if want to have a wedding in a public spot.  This shot for me was a winner and I was impressed with the Phase One IQ180 which I was blessed to use on this day.  The conditions were less than perfect as I was shooting into direct sunlight and the wind was blowing close to 30 mph at times and really never stopped, which can be a common occurance at Sam’s anytime of the year.

To make matters worse, I was using a CCD Phase One IQ180 and knew that I was going to be limited in the shutter speeds I could use.  I also knew that I more than likely would get some massive flare since I was shooting directly into the sun.  I have seen that the Schneider’s don’t create as much of a damaging flare as the Rodenstock lenses do.  At the time of this shot, I was using a Rodenstock 28mm and the Schneider 43mm.  I knew I wanted the wide range of the 28mm, but I also knew that I would pay for the use of the Rodenstock with massive damaging flare.  So I used the Schneider and was very happy with the result.

I did not use a CL-PL as I was concerned that I limit the amount of available light and thus create too much noise.  Instead I took a series of bracketing exposures.  I took this shot in a vertical series, but the Schneider is not noted for a great amount of hyperfocal range ever with tilt, so I figured I would not use the lower parts.  After looking at the shot, I liked the center segment the best and just went with it.  It’s going to be hard to see in this shot, but I was able to stop most of the motion at 1/125 of second shutter speed.  The Schneider created a wonderful solar flare, which reached all the way through the shot.  Many times such flares are faked later on Photoshop, but this one came from the aperture setting of F11.  There were some contrails to contend with, but overall the colors I was able to pull from this shot still make me pretty happy.