How to Effectively Photograph Water
For many nature photographers, water can be an important element of composition and an aggravating subject to photograph. However, after understanding a few technical aspects of photographing water, as a subject, the practice is much simpler. Instead of worrying about how to shoot, you can consider how to use water to your advantage. It can be used as one of the several wonderful elements of composition or to create a mood within the image.
Lets cover a few technical aspects first. Shutter speeds have the ability to portray motion in water. Regardless of how swiftly the body of water is moving, the motion can either be frozen or shown as a calm progression, often described as a milky blur. At a shutter speed of 1/125 of a second, water can be frozen. This is great to do this when trying to photograph waves crashing against a rocky coast. However, as you increase the time of the shutter (for example 1/60, 1/30, or 1/15 of a second) you tend to lose definition in the water without the ultimate desired effect. Once you are below 1/8 of a second on the shutter, you can achieve the calm blurring of water. The effectiveness of this practice only increases with longer times.
To photograph an image and freeze water, you can generally meter and shoot. Choose the corresponding aperture to allow a shutter speed at 1/125 of a second or greater. But when photographing water for a blurred effect, often the metered light will not allow us to shoot an exposure longer than 1/4 a second. The best suggestion to remedy the situation is through a circular polarizing filter. Most of these filters can remove at least two stops of light. (That means if the scene called for F22 at 1/15 of a second, adding a polarizing filter to the lens allows the shot to be taken at 1/4 a second.)
The motion of water also has several strong elements of composition to consider. Water can often act as a leading line for our eyes. Use it as an element to take a viewer through a photograph from the foreground to the background. Consider the shot of Glacier National Park. The small river in the foreground takes your eyes naturally to the mountains and then above. Using water such as this can help create simple, clean compositions that are pleasing to the eye.
Another way to use water as an element of composition is to utilize its reflective qualities. Lake reflection shots help a scene by adding an uncommon symmetry to any composition. But, consider placement when using this technique. There are several effective positions to place the scene in your frame besides the middle. If your not familiar with the “four power points,” the “2/3 - 1/3 rule,” or the “90 – 10 rule” then consult my Basic Compositions Article.
However, my favorite use of the motion of water is the creation of moods in photographs. Depending on the feeling you would like to convey, you can freeze the water for a turbulent scene or slowly blur the water for a calm, serene photograph. You’ll need to make those decisions when you decide what you want to communicate.
Note: For practice…
The best exercise to figure out the relationship between your shutter speeds and motion is to photograph the same scene nine times. Use the shutter speeds 125, 60, 30, 15, 8, 4, 2, 1,and 2 seconds. Obviously use the corresponding F-stops to properly expose the photos. If this is not self-explanatory, consult my Camera Basics Article for further explanation of relationships between F-stops and shutter speeds.
