My family and I live in rural Iowa, nestled between several wind farms. The perks of living out here, besides having solitude and a simple way of living, are the many opportunities for photographing the sky. We have the most glorious skies!
Oftentimes our cameras can have a difficult time conveying the beauty of a sky, especially when you have another subject in the frame. It can be so frustrating not to be able to capture the beauty of what you see in front of you. But, there are some tricks to photographing the sky in order to achieve that perfect exposure and preserve the details and colors you see in real life. I’m going to share my tips for successfully photographing skies, along with two video tutorials that will show you how to really create impact when editing sky photos.
If you try out any of these techniques, please share your sky pictures over on IG and tag #click.magazine. I’d love to see!
1. Slightly underexpose or bracket your shot.
I’m pretty notorious for slightly underexposing my images in camera. But it’s one of the best recommendations I have to capture skies without blowing out highlights or losing any details. I like to start out by underexposing my image by ½ stop, then a full stop, and sometimes even 2 full stops. This way, I’m getting more than enough shots to view the differences in how well the sky looks and then I can cull out the ones that are not so desirable.
With this method, you really want to find a happy medium in underexposing for your sky, yet keeping just enough exposure on your subject and foreground so it’s not completely underexposed. You can then add more exposure as needed when you take your image into post processing. I do this by using a combination of graduated filters, radial filters, and brushes in Adobe Lightroom. Â
An alternative to just shooting underexposed images would be to bracket your images and merge them together in post processing. Bracketing provides a variety of exposures and creates a wonderful range of highlights, shadows, and tones. To bracket an image, you want to take 5 shots: full stop underexposed, ½ stop underexposed, properly exposed, ½ stop overexposed, and then a full stop overexposed. Then you will merge all five images together in post processing. You can do this by selecting the Photo/Photo Merge/HDR option in Adobe Lightroom.Â
2. Use a narrow aperture.
Another great trick for photographing the sky is to use a narrow aperture of f/4 or smaller. A small aperture will provide a deep depth of field and will retain your sky and any other details way out into the horizon. It is also a great way to capture a starburst effect from the sun if you’ve included it in your composition.
Here are three of my favorite images using a narrow aperture of f/7.Â
3. Use a low ISO on sunny days.
The majority of images I shoot are usually with a wide open aperture of f/2.8 or larger, only because I prefer a shallow depth of field in my work. The way that I compensate for not allowing in too much light, especially for high noon shots, is to drop my ISO very low. Â
When photographing during bright, sunny days, I have found that an ISO of 100 or even lower will reduce the brightness of the sunlight, further preserving color and contrast. If your camera has the capability to use an ISO lower than 100, I recommend doing so when the sunlight is not so forgiving.
This photo was taken in the late morning hours with an ISO of 80.Â
4. Break out the wide angle lens.
A wide angle lens has a magnificent way of adding scale, making your sky the main focus of your story. My go-to wide angle lens for capturing skies is my Nikon 14mm f/2.8.
Wide angle lenses create exaggerated perspectives and unique distortions, but depending on what you’re trying to achieve, it can be a nuisance. I always recommend applying your lens correction settings in post processing and tweaking any unwanted distortion by using the transform tool in Adobe Lightroom. These tools just about always do the trick in fixing those distortion problems.
Check out the skies in these photos that I took using my wide angle lens:
5. Apply a polarizing filter.
Polarizing filters can really enhance tones and vibrant colors, resulting in a very rich photograph. The main purpose of a polarizing filter is to reduce the reflections and haze from the sun, and they will also aid in retaining the details in your sky. Two types of polarizing filters are linear and circular. Each of these has their own way of modifying light waves.
I recommend the B+W XS-Pro Kaesemann High Transmission Circular Polarizer MRC-Nano Filter but you could also try the Hoya Alpha Circular Polarizing Filter for a more economical option.
A digital option would be to apply a polarizing preset to your image in post processing. These are usually found within preset collections sold by image processing companies and do a pretty decent job replicating an actual polarizing filter. I recommend checking out the NIK Collection by DxO if you choose the digital method. Â
6. Take advantage of post processing tools.
There are many editing tools at your fingertips to recover or enhance a sky. My favorite processing method in Adobe Lightroom is to drag the graduated filter tool over the sky and, within the graduated filter, increase the dehaze slider. Doing this will bring balance of light and color from the top of the sky all the way down to the horizon and also bring out depth and contrast from the clouds.
Keep in mind that too much dehazing can bring out unwanted noise so if you do use this tool, pay close attention and apply noise reduction if needed. Â
See the editing video below for a tutorial of how I edited this double rainbow image:
Here’s a video demonstration of how to edit a rainbow photo.
Here’s why (and how) to make the sky your main subject.
Making a sky the main focus in your image truly brings out an overall wow factor. Here are three ways you can achieve this:
Observation: Is the sky bright and cheerful or intense and gloomy? Is there anything unique — like puffy clouds that dot into the horizon or a massive incoming storm — to help create mood and character in your image? If you aim to make these features part of your story when photographing the sky, the sky alone will captivate and draw in your viewer!Â
The right lens: To make the sky the focal point of your image, your best bet is to shoot with a 24mm lens or wider. As mentioned in tip number 4, a wide angle lens is a great choice in achieving scale and it really opens up the world as you see it to your viewer.   Â
Composition:  Make the sky dominate your frame. I typically do this by tilting my camera plane slightly upwards, which then places my horizon line and my subject more towards the bottom of my frame. The goal here is to really grab the viewer’s attention by filling up the bulk of your image with the sky. If you try this method, don’t forget to apply the transform tool to your image to fix any awkward distortions that your camera tilt may have created.
Watch my video demonstration of how stretching out the sky in post processing completely transformed my image to create a much bigger impact. Look at the difference from the before (below) to after (right).
Here’s how I expanded the sky to match my creative vision (Video).
Don’t forget to share and tag your sky photos #click.magazine for a chance to be featured on Click’s Instagram.
Photos by Katharine Vogel
