On 13th March I had just got back from a trip to Venice and I was really excited to share a light trail image of boat traffic on the Grand Canal taken from the viewpoint on Ponte dell'Accademia.
It was my first attempt at a light trail and of blending images in Photoshop and although I was happy with the overall image I knew there was something missing from the process and I needed to do a little more research to improve the image.
What I have shared today is a result of that further research.
The first two images are composite images from 10 30 second exposures (so 5 minutes in total) which I have layered and blended in Photoshop. Given they are long exposures there is some blurring of stars in the night sky and while I have not removed any of that in the black and white image I have applied some correction in the colour image as the brighter colours made the blurring more obvious and somewhat distracting.
The final two images are composites of four 30 second exposures taken from a slightly different angle. This is the image I shared on 13th March but with a better blending process which allows more detail to come through. As the overall exposure time was less than the first two shots there is less distraction from the stars but also fewer light trails from the boats. As I said in the original post, at this time of year there was less traffic on the canals than would be usual during the summer months and so the light trails were less prominent, however the relative absence of visitors to the city meant that I was able to get these shots without getting in anyone else's way.
Overall I have to say I am very pleased with these images and I am really happy to have learned a new technique which I hope to develop further at some point in the future.
