Lesson Info
70. Golden Hour: Sunrise & Sunset Light
Summary (Generated from Transcript)
The topic of this lesson is the fundamentals of photography during the golden hour, specifically focusing on sunrise and sunset light. Q&A:
What are the advantages of shooting during the golden hour?
The light during this time is soft, diffused, and has a lot of nice colors. It also has lower contrast, allowing for the capture of both highlights and details.
How often does the golden hour occur in a day?
The golden hour occurs twice a day, during sunrise and sunset.
Why is it important to be prepared when shooting during the golden hour?
The lighting conditions during the golden hour can change quickly, so photographers need to be ready to capture the best moments.
What camera setting is recommended for shooting during the golden hour?
Using manual exposure mode is recommended, as it allows for more control over the exposure settings.
What is the purpose of using a split neutral density filter during the golden hour?
A split neutral density filter helps to balance the brightness of the top and bottom halves of the image, especially when there is a significant difference in brightness between the two.
What are the different levels of light during sunrise and sunset?
The different levels of light include astronomical twilight, nautical twilight, and civil twilight, each representing different stages of light before sunrise or after sunset.
How can photographers extend the blue zone during the golden hour?
By using longer shutter speeds, photographers can capture more light and extend the period of the blue zone.
How does the type of cloud cover affect photography during the golden hour?
Overcast days provide even lighting, clear days are good for using the blue zone and shooting silhouettes, and partial cloud cover can result in interesting cloud light at certain moments.
Lessons
Class Introduction
23:32 2Photographic Characteristics
06:46 3Camera Types
03:03 4Viewing System
22:09 5Lens System
24:38 6Shutter System
12:56 7Shutter Speed Basics
10:16 8Shutter Speed Effects
31:57Camera & Lens Stabilization
11:06 10Quiz: Shutter Speeds
07:55 11Camera Settings Overview
16:12 12Drive Mode & Buffer
04:24 13Camera Settings - Details
10:21 14Sensor Size: Basics
18:26 15Sensor Sizes: Compared
24:52 16The Sensor - Pixels
22:49 17Sensor Size - ISO
26:59 18Focal Length
11:36 19Angle of View
31:29 20Practicing Angle of View
04:59 21Quiz: Focal Length
08:15 22Fisheye Lens
12:32 23Tilt & Shift Lens
20:37 24Subject Zone
13:16 25Lens Speed
09:03 26Aperture
08:25 27Depth of Field (DOF)
21:46 28Quiz: Apertures
08:22 29Lens Quality
07:06 30Light Meter Basics
09:04 31Histogram
11:48 32Quiz: Histogram
09:07 33Dynamic Range
07:25 34Exposure Modes
35:15 35Sunny 16 Rule
04:31 36Exposure Bracketing
08:08 37Exposure Values
20:01 38Quiz: Exposure
20:44 39Focusing Basics
13:08 40Auto Focus (AF)
24:39 41Focus Points
17:18 42Focus Tracking
19:26 43Focusing Q&A
06:40 44Manual Focus
07:14 45Digital Focus Assistance
07:35 46Shutter Speeds & Depth of Field (DOF)
05:18 47Quiz: Depth of Field
15:54 48DOF Preview & Focusing Screens
04:55 49Lens Sharpness
11:08 50Camera Movement
11:29 51Advanced Techniques
15:15 52Quiz: Hyperfocal Distance
07:14 53Auto Focus Calibration
05:15 54Focus Stacking
07:58 55Quiz: Focus Problems
18:54 56Camera Accessories
32:41 57Lens Accessories
29:24 58Lens Adaptors & Cleaning
13:14 59Macro
13:02 60Flash & Lighting
04:47 61Tripods
14:13 62Cases
06:07 63Being a Photographer
11:29 64Natural Light: Direct Sunlight
28:37 65Natural Light: Indirect Sunlight
15:57 66Natural Light: Mixed
04:20 67Twilight: Sunrise & Sunset Light
22:21 68Cloud & Color Pop: Sunrise & Sunset Light
06:40 69Silhouette & Starburst: Sunrise & Sunset Light
07:28 70Golden Hour: Sunrise & Sunset Light
07:52 71Quiz: Lighting
05:42 72Light Management
10:46 73Flash Fundamentals
12:06 74Speedlights
04:12 75Built-In & Add-On Flash
10:47 76Off-Camera Flash
25:48 77Off-Camera Flash For Portraits
15:36 78Advanced Flash Techniques
08:22 79Editing Assessments & Goals
08:57 80Editing Set-Up
06:59 81Importing Images
03:59 82Organizing Your Images
32:41 83Culling Images
13:57 84Categories of Development
30:59 85Adjusting Exposure
08:03 86Remove Distractions
04:02 87Cropping Your Images
09:53 88Composition Basics
26:36 89Point of View
28:56 90Angle of View
14:35 91Subject Placement
23:22 92Framing Your Shot
07:27 93Foreground & Background & Scale
03:51 94Rule of Odds
05:00 95Bad Composition
07:31 96Multi-Shot Techniques
19:08 97Pixel Shift, Time Lapse, Selective Cloning & Noise Reduction
12:24 98Human Vision vs The Camera
23:32 99Visual Perception
10:43 100Quiz: Visual Balance
14:05 101Visual Drama
16:45 102Elements of Design
09:24 103Texture & Negative Space
03:57 104Black & White & Color
10:33 105The Photographic Process
09:08 106Working the Shot
25:29 107What Makes a Great Photograph?
07:01Lesson Info
Golden Hour: Sunrise & Sunset Light
We had twilight, we had cloud light and then we have sunrise and sunset our golden hour which of course actual times may vary according to your location, this hour may be half an hour if you're down near the equator, sun rises very quickly and moves up in the sky a little bit more quickly and so that first ray of light, those last bursts of light coming through are sometimes the best because they're the lowest light levels but they have a lot of nice color to them. So they have a lot of good advantages, it's soft, it's a little bit more diffused 'cause the light's cutting through more atmosphere, lower contrast which means we can see the highlights and the details if we look at our lion here we can see some of the face is in the shadows, some parts are in the highlights, but we can see detail in both, it's not too extreme in this case. Obviously sunrise and sunset that's two we've got two opportunities per day to shoot under this, until we get to tatooine where we have two suns then it...
's still going to be a bit of a problem here. So it comes and goes obviously very quickly and it varies quite a bit from day to day and so you've got to be prepared for that. And so in these cases you want to be looking for clouds to see if you're going to be able to include them have them a part of it or not. I typically want to be in manual exposure on this, I do like working with muralist cameras because I can see the results that I'm likely to get even before I take the picture, with SLR's I typically shoot a photo, check the exposure on the back, and then proceed from there and oftentimes this is a little bit on the darker side, that's just kind of where landscapes tend to be in many of these cases and so you're often underexposing by a third or two thirds of a stop. Situations like this I'm obviously or maybe not obviously but I am using a split neutral density filter to hold back some of the brightness 'cause that's very bright on the top half and I still want you to see the bottom half as well. Getting a little bit of a starburst there waiting for that light to go through that little rock opening. Getting a little bit of cloud light in here nice blue skies as well so we're getting a good collection of colors in here. This is in Monument Valley, there had been a rainstorm just prior to this and everything was covered in clouds and the wind was blowing pretty well and it blew it out very very quickly and so things happen very very quickly so you just have to be on guard and ready to move at a moment's notice and when I was a kid I wanted to be a fireman you know it's like okay ready to go, got everything ready got the door open, I've got my bag ready to go and so you kind of have to be like that as a photographer because you never know when the light's going to be ready for the best situation. Alright so let's look at another graph of light here and so we're going to be measuring our light here again and our light quality and so this is at sunset and we do have a time lapse going in the background and so we have nice golden light which is generally a pretty good time to shoot with sunlight and once it hits sunset it starts getting darker a lot quicker and we lose a little bit of light in here but then it kind of comes back and they get the lights on and we get that blue zone right there and that's a great time to shoot in there and so there's kind of this gap between the last light and the blue zone, now we didn't get any cloud light in this time right here and then it runs into just dark and where it's nighttime photography for those who want to get out there and just shoot nighttime stuff and so we had two different moments here and I know most of the time when you shoot sunset right about here where it starts getting worse a lot of people leave, time to leave, get in the car it's getting cold and get out of here. But some of the photographers who want to get that second little peek there, there's a great time to come back right there and shoot in a scene like that. Now you can actually look up online in the newspaper on your apps as to what time is sunset and you're going to find some different categories, going to talk about these different categories of where the light is and so as the light's down below the horizon there are different levels and so there is true nighttime we all know that, but then there is astronomical twilight. And if you're wanting to look at the stars you don't want to be out during astronomical twilight 'cause there's starting to be a little bit of blue in the sky and so night is when it is pitch black and so the sun's starting to get closer to the horizon as it gets up to 12 degrees then it becomes nautical twilight. And I'm guessing that's because it's a good time to be operating a boat, you don't need light so you can see relatively easily and this is just a bit before sunrise and then we get to civil twilight and I think this is right about where a lot of the lights in cities are turned on or turned off, there's sometimes cities have regulations when it gets to a certain light level things have to turn on and off and this is nautical twilight, right in there is probably when that photographer's twilight that we've been talking about, that's about when it's at its peak when it's that much below the horizon, whether it's sunrise or sunset before we actually get to our sunrise here. And moving on to full daytime. And so you'll see these listed as what time nautical twilight begins and nautical twilight ends and this can be really important if you're going out to photograph the Milky Way for instance and it needs to be perfectly dark at this latitude on the planet, in summertime you've got to wait til about 11:30 or midnight before really all the blue in the sky is totally gone so that you can see the stars really easily and so photographs from different times of the city at the golden hour, right at sunset, when you get a nice twilight, and then when that blue zone ends and you can extend the blue zone a little bit with longer shutter speeds and so if you're getting a nice blue there's going to be a peak period and then you should start cranking it for longer and longer shutter speeds to keep a little bit of that lightness in the blue 'cause it starts getting darker and darker and darker, but at a certain point you just can't push it anymore and it's become full nighttime. And so gradient light there are three different types of days as I see it here, we have overcast days, and they're going to start off pretty dark and they're not too exciting on the sunset, if it calls for a full overcast day, you can probably sleep in, don't need to get up at the crack of dawn for that 'cause you're going to have nice even lighting, it's a good day to take the macro lens out and shoot detailed subjects. If there are no clouds at all it's going to be a totally clear day, well that's a good chance to use the blue zone, shooting with that twilight in the background shooting silhouettes for instance, and then possibly a good chance for shooting first light as well, we just don't get the cloud light in there and so you might have a nice good hour of shooting after sunrise in that particular case. Now if you have partial clouds, that's a really good time you may or may not get good blue zone 'cause clouds may be blocking the light and if the clouds are in the right position and the light hits them in the right way you could end up with really good cloud light then it kind of gets bad again and then you have some nice good first light as well. And so be prepared for these ups and downs of shooting with light and I've been talking about this mostly from a landscape travel perspective, but this can also work for portrait photography as well.
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Ratings and Reviews
a Creativelive Student
Love love all John Greengo classes! Wish to have had him decades ago with this info, but no internet then!! John is the greatest photography teacher I have seen out there, and I watch a lot of Creative Live classes and folks on YouTube too. John is so detailed and there are a ton of ah ha moments for me and I know lots of others. I think I own 4 John Greengo classes so far and want to add this one and Travel Photography!! I just drop everything to watch John on Creative Live. I wish sometime soon he would teach a Lightroom class and his knowledge on photography post editing.!!! That would probably take a LOT OF TIME but I know John would explain it soooooo good, like he does all his Photography classes!! Thank you Creative Live for having such a wonderful instructor with John Greengo!! Make more classes John, for just love them and soak it up! There is soooo much to learn and sometimes just so overwhelming. Is there anyway you might do a Motivation class!!?? Like do this button for this day, and try this technique for a week, or post this subject for this week, etc. Motivation and inspiration, and playing around with what you teach, needed so much and would be so fun.!! Just saying??? Awaiting gadgets class now, while waiting for lunch break to be over. All the filters and gadgets, oh my. Thank you thank you for all you teach John, You are truly a wonderful wonderful instructor and I would highly recommend folks listening and buying your classes.
Eve
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JUAN SOL
Dear John, thanks for this outstanding classes. You are not only a great photographer and instructor, but your classes are pleasant, they are not boring, with a good sense of humor, they go straight to the point and have a good time listening to you. Please, keep teaching what you like most, and I will continue to look for your classes. And thanks for using a plain English, that it's important for people who has another language as native language. Thanks again, Juan