Light Trails on the Grand Canal 2

 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.

Light Trails On the Grand Canal

 I have just got back from a short break in Venice. One of the things I was keen to try was capturing light trails on the Grand Canal. I had been to Venice a few times before but had never taken a tripod with me so long exposures were out of the question. This time rather than pack an extra jumper and a second pair of shoes I packed one of my tripods and a variable ND filter along with my other kit.

I tried a few different shots and above is just one of them but in colour and in black and white. It is a composite image from three 30 second exposures which I have blended in Photo Shop. It is the first time I have ever tried this and some of what I had hoped would remain in the final image is not there so I need to practice a bit to see what else I can do.

Being early in March there was less traffic on the canal than there would be on a summers evening so again the light trails are not as standout as I had hoped but nonetheless I think these are really effective and for a first attempt I am pretty pleased. I have other shots to work on which will be composite of up to 12 exposures so there is the possibility that there will be even more detail in them although of course 12 images may be too many and I really need to experiment to get the best possible final result. 

This shot was taken from the Ponte dell'Accademia facing out towards the lagoon. I really like the black and white image because it has a cool night time feel however because Venice is such a colourful city I prefer the second image as it highlights the warmth and richness of the buildings and also because of the long exposure the stars are visible and show up in colour too, not just as the white or yellow dots we normally see when we look up at the night sky.