Hey,
I went out for a walk along the beach and tried capturing a different angle of these palm trees. This is almost straight out of camera, with only a few minor contrast adjustments in Lightroom, no Photoshop. The long exposure gave nice movement in the leaves and there was a light source about twenty feet behind the trees. It almost feels like the two trees are partners :). I set a 30 second exposure at f/22 and ISO 2000 with an 18mm on my D7200. What do you think of the result?
great concept Mike. I find the lens flares a bit distracting though. Some people like the lens flare look so its a matter of personal choice. I would try to shade the lens from the light source and try again to compare with and without the flares..
Hey, thanks Michael! Yeah you're right it's definitely the focal point of the photo. I did take more shots there without the lens flare, but this one caught my eye only because of how much light flare built up over that 30 seconds. It's hard to describe but I did not expect this result directly out of camera when I lined up the shot, haha. Here is one without the flare taken to the right of the above photo.
Thanks again for dropping a line, much appreciated.
I think the palm trees become the clear subject without the flares. This shot with a clear sky background, and working to clean the few remaining flares is what I would target. Nice work!