25 February 2014

Clueless Comes Good - The Story of a Stroll in the Storms.

In my last post I promised to expand further on one of the tips my Turkish professional film maker language student gave me - using the HDR option to take better photos on our phones.    

I shall keep it quick and in simple language for clueless folk like me, because I want to be getting on with showing you pictures of the sea in the recent windy weather.  Those who know what they're doing can pass right on by this bit.

HDR stands for High Dynamic Range.  There are plenty of websites that go into the finer details, but the upshot is that your camera takes three different photographs of the same thing and superimposes them all so that you get the best bit of each to make the best possible one.  Here are a couple of examples:

Normal setting.

HDR setting.

Normal setting.


HDR setting.


It's to do with the different exposures - where the light is brought in better in different areas and it's brilliant for these outdoor ones where I'd previously found it frustrating that those of the sea appeared rather more gloomy than had actually seemed the case at the time.  My kindly teacher has gone on to explain about shutter speeds and how he uses three sources of light - including a flash during daylight sometimes to avoid a shadow like the one he took in this one, for example - 


Without flash.

With flash, using the sea and sky as the other two sources of light.

- but, to be honest, I'm happy with just pointing and shooting with the tips he's already given me and in one of these photographs below - where the details of the spray (which my sons refer to as 'fireworks') were lost against the light of the sky it has been better to keep the original picture rather than the HDR one for contrast.  The phone gives both versions of photographs magically (see 'Settings' otherwise, but you know better than to ask me).  

There endeth our lesson.  However, here's another tip that I discovered for myself after taking these and you won't get this on any posh photography sites (!) - when your phone gets stuck on its 'headphones' setting, even though you haven't used it and you can't get it to switch back to work normally, this will be because it has come into contact with water and you'll need to take a hairdryer to it.  If you're very lucky, once you've indulged in plenty of self-pitying panicking and learned your lesson sufficiently, it might sort itself out.  *Blushes*   

So without further ado, here is the story of a stroll I took when the tide was OUT but coming in.  In almost twenty years of living in and close to Brighton I have never seen the sea anywhere near as high.  Half an hour later, walking back along the cliff top, I could see it would have been downright dangerous to be down there still. Those high waves are carrying pebbles and those concourses are usually clear for walkers, cyclists, roller bladers and maniacal kids on scooters, not least and namely mine.  

Although it was awesome, I felt scared for those suffering in the floods.  The power of the water was incredible.

The tide is out, but coming in. 



I'm not the only one fascinated.

The morning after the night before.    

Walking further along. 

Can you see those pebbles?

The non-HDR.

'Fireworks.'



I got soaked!



My favourite.



Past the worst.

There's been no scooting since, but at least we're safe, warm and dry.



Continuing my walk.


Still very deep.

Heading up to the cliff top.

All the Small Things - MummyNeverSleeps