Struggling With Sunrise Shots

Cloudwalker · Nov 21, 2007

Howdy all! It's been a while since I last posted here, but here is my delima: I'm having trouble with sunrise shots. My sky turns out great but the foreground is just black. I can't seem to get a lot of detail other than from the sky light. I'm using a Canon S3 with manual settings. I have tried several combinations of aperature & exposure settings but I just can't seem to get the results that I'm after. Here is one of the better shots:

abraxas · Nov 21, 2007

I'd suggest looking into HDR. I've had very good luck with bringing out the detail in predawn shots like this.

RKW3 · Nov 21, 2007

HDR is probably the best option, just go into aperture priority mode, select your aperture, then take one shot -2 EV, one shot 0 EV, and one shot +2 EV (use a tripod). Then merge with Photomatix or Photoshop.

I don't see too many other options than HDR here, sorry.