click photo to enlargeHere's another image in my recently begun quest to capture movement in nature using motion blur. Regular visitors may remember shots of the wind stirring some unripe barley and the waves on a shallow, stony-bottomed river. Today's photograph shows wind passing across a reed bed.
During a recent walk on a bright but quite windy day at Surfleet Seas End in Lincolnshire, I came upon this stand of reeds near the outfall of the River Glen. The low afternoon sun was offering some good contre jour shots of the feathery heads of the common reeds (Phragmites australis). However, the wind had other ideas. Each shot I made of selected heads using a long focal length lens was slightly blurred. So, rather than fight it I thought I may as well co-operate with the inevitable and do some deliberately blurred images. Looking at the wind passing over the reed bed I could see rippled lines being formed in the vegetation so I made these the focus of my efforts. It took about 6 shots to get this, the best of the bunch, with the lens stopped down to its maximum to produce the shutter speed of 1/10 second. I was pleased to get the blurred "waves" and at the same time some leaves and stems that were fairly sharp.
photograph & text (c) T. Boughen
Camera: Olympus E510
Mode: Aperture Priority
Focal Length: 102mm (204mm/35mm equiv.)
F No: f22
Shutter Speed: 1/10
ISO: 100
Exposure Compensation: -0.7 EV
Image Stabilisation: On
