Looking Into the Rainbow
Normally when you look at a rainbow off in the distance, it is actually way out there. Well if you get a 1200 mm lens and point it into the base of the rainbow, you might see something like this. That far ridge is at least 3 miles away with the closest trees at a mile. Telephoto images are notorious for having distance perspective crushed. You might think I’m standing at a normal 55mm just a few hundred feet from those closest trees. As I say… they are a mile out. Crushed is good for getting the proper look for this kind of perspective.
Rainbows are infinitely movable as you change your position to the sun. You can move a rainbow to align it over what you wish if there is enough rain shaft plus you are mobile. All rainbows are on the other side of the sky from the sun since they are a refracted light phenomena. If looking at the sun, you see a “rainbow” like phenomena like 22 degree halos and a host of others are on the sun side of the sky. The other side of the sky is strictly rainbows.
Photographic Musings: Manual Settings… Only three settings.
Distance is your friend. OK, another F-stop discussion…. High F-stop numbers take away a LOT of light from your light capture boxes. (camera). The higher the number, the smaller the hole in the lens for light to travel through. At the same time you make that hole smaller by turning up the F-stop number, you are thickening the “depth of field” focus depth. F-stop becomes a double edged sword. You can open up the aperture (turn down the f-stop number) and get a lot more light versus a pin hole at maximum F-stop setting. But you loose depth of field/focus depth) So Bigger hole in the lens= shallow depth of field but a lot of light. A smaller hole in the aperture means less light but it gives you the ability to focus on things close AND far at the same time. SO, you have to compensate for HIGH f stop numbers by adjusting the other two settings. Turning up camera sensitivity (ISO) boosts what little light that comes through a small hole in the lens. IT’s a double edge sword too though. More Camera Sensitivity (higher ISO) will give you a grainy image and introduce color noise. Speckles and big grain are not desirable so moderation is necessary. Lastly you have shutter speed. Slower than 100th of a second you risk blurring moving objects. Any movement from anything would blur under longer exposures. Rule of thumb is 1/100th for minimum handheld telephoto to 400mm (rested).
Location: Biss Dinosaur Ranch, Wyoming/Montana borderlands. (Wyotana)
Title: Looking Into the Rainbow