Bad weather, good photos

Learning goal

You will be able to read turning weather not as a reason to pack up and leave, but as a reason to wait, and predict which moment of a storm adds most to a landscape. As a storm passes, you will wait for the short gap that opens between the clouds, and expose a dark sky while keeping its detail. Knowing that rain only shows in the frame when lit from behind, you will make the drops visible, and protect your lens and camera from rain, wind and sudden temperature change. On a foggy morning, you will see the landscape as a sea of fog by climbing not to the bottom of the valley but above the fog. If there is a person in a raincoat in the frame, you will take into account the shine on wet skin and the raincoat reflecting its color onto their face, and keep the face in its own color on every skin.

The question

As your friend packs up on the rocky shore, a leaden mass of cloud approaches from the north. The wind sharpens, big drops begin to fall on the tripod. They stuff the camera in the bag, run to the car and look at the sea from behind the glass. Ten minutes later the rain thins; a beam of light seeping between the clouds paints the opposite rocks yellow, the end of a rainbow appears over the sea. The camera is in the bag, the tripod in the trunk. The light fades within a few minutes. Why is a storm an opportunity?

Context

In the weather conditions lesson you met the soft light of cloudy weather, fog making everything distant paler and separating it into layers, and the sun seeping between dark clouds striking like stage light (Lesson 5.5). In the planning lesson you saw looking at a forecast that reads the height of clouds separately, and under what conditions morning fog settles into valleys (Lesson M.2). While working on filters, too, you compared a bright sky and a dark foreground with spot metering first to balance them (Lesson M.5).

Those lessons told the light of bad weather. This lesson takes up how to stand inside that light: which moment of the storm to wait for, how to show rain in the frame, whether to go into the fog or above it, and how to protect yourself and your camera meanwhile. Bad weather gives the landscape photographer the rarest light; but this light is short and falls only on the one waiting there, ready.

Simple explanation

Which moment of the storm is waited for?

A weather break is the short time when, as a storm or a rain front passes, a gap opens between the clouds and the low sun seeps onto a wet, dark landscape. It often comes at the trailing edge of the front: the rain thins, the mass of cloud pulls away in one direction, and the light falls on a hill, a rocky outcrop or a field in front of a sky that is still dark. This moment can last a few minutes; that is why the photographer who, instead of packing up and leaving when the rain starts, waits in a sheltered place with the camera ready catches it.

A bright subject in front of a dark sky makes exposure hard. The camera tries to pull the dark clouds to average and turns the sky light gray, while burning out the lit rocks. Exposing for the brightest detail of the lit subject, lowering the exposure by one or two stops if needed, leaves the clouds dark and textured and the lit subject readable. In such a frame the sky can carry a large part of the frame; bringing the horizon down makes the clouds' weight felt in the frame.

How does rain show in the frame?

Backlit rain is when drops are lit by light from behind and appear as bright lines or dots in front of a dark background. In light from the front, or in front of a bright sky, rain is often almost invisible in the frame; it only grays the air a little. When there is a low sun, a street lamp or a bright cloud behind the drops, and a dark tree, a slope or a doorway in front of them, the rain suddenly appears.

The shutter speed also chooses the rain's shape. At roughly 1/60 to 1/125 the drops leave short, slanting lines and show the rain's direction; at very short times they freeze as individual dots. Drops falling on the front of the lens, on the other hand, leave blurred spots in the frame. Shooting with the wind behind you, mounting the lens hood and checking the front glass every few frames reduces these spots. To protect the camera from rain, a simple rain cover, or a bag and a rubber band, can be enough. When going from cold, wet weather into a warm car or home, leaving the camera in its bag and waiting for it to warm up slowly prevents inner and outer surfaces from fogging up. When you hear thunder, though, no frame is worth waiting for; you need to leave open ground and high points at once.

Into the fog, or above it?

A sea of fog is a landscape in which the fog filling a valley or a plain looks like a sea when seen from a higher point. On a cloudless night the ground gives its heat up to the sky, the cooling heavy air slides down the slopes to the valley bottom, and if there is no wind, fog collects there. Someone standing inside the valley sees only a gray blanket; someone who climbs a hill a few hundred meters above sees the sun above the fog, and hills and treetops rising out of the fog.

Both views have their place. Inside the fog, a close tree or a fence looks dark and clear while what's behind sinks into white; the scene simplifies and grows quiet. Above the fog, the landscape is wide, bright and layered. Which you choose is something you can decide in advance by reading the forecast and the map. If there is a person in the frame, wet skin reflects more light and bright spots appear on the forehead, nose and cheekbones; on dark skin these highlights show more clearly. A bright yellow or orange raincoat can also reflect its own color onto their face. Turning the person a little to the side relative to the light and setting the white balance for their face rather than the raincoat brings back the skin's real tone.

Visual evidence

A week later another front approaches on the same shore. This time your friend puts on the rain cover and shelters under a rocky overhang. The forecast says the front will pull away to the east within half an hour.

When the rain thins, the sun seeps from the west, behind them. The opposite rocks are painted yellow, the sky still leaden. They expose for the brightest part of the rocks and stop down one stop; the clouds are dark and textured, the rocks detailed. Then they turn west, toward the sun: the last drops falling in front of the dark pines between them and the sun shine like silver lines in the backlight.

Their hiking companion, a dark-skinned woman in a yellow raincoat, looks at the rocks. The raindrops on her face shine, the raincoat's hood reflects a yellow light onto her chin. Your friend turns her a little to the side relative to the light and sets the white balance for her face; her skin is in its own warm brown, the drops each a point of light.

Common mistakes

Summary

A storm is an opportunity because, as a front passes, the short gap that opens between the clouds lights a wet landscape with low sun in front of a dark sky; this light falls only on the one waiting with the camera ready, and is exposed for the lit subject. Rain becomes visible in backlight and in front of a dark background, climbing above the fog shows the landscape as a sea of fog; the camera is protected from rain and fogging, and the person is shown in their own color, taking into account the shine on wet skin and the color the raincoat reflects.

Mini assignment

In this assignment you will shoot by waiting for bad weather.

1. For a day when rain or fog is expected, look at the forecast and note when the front will pull away or in which valley the fog will collect.
2. In the rain, put the light not behind you but in front of you and shoot the drops against a dark background; as the rain eases, wait for the weather break and expose for the lit subject.
3. If someone in a raincoat is in the frame, look at the highlights on their face and the color the raincoat reflects onto it, and set the white balance for their skin.

Check yourself

• Were you able to catch the weather break, did the sky stay dark and textured?
• Are the raindrops visible in the frame?
• Did the person's skin in the frame shift to the raincoat's color, or is it in its own color?

Glossary

Mini quiz

1. When does a weather break most often come?

• A) At the moment the rain is heaviest
• B) At the front's trailing edge, as the rain thins and the clouds pull away
• C) At midnight
• D) Always at noon

2. When do raindrops show best in the frame?

• A) In front light, in front of a bright sky
• B) When the light comes from above
• C) In backlight and in front of a dark background
• D) Never

3. Where do you go to see a sea of fog?

• A) To the very bottom of the valley
• B) Under a tree inside the fog
• C) Inside a building
• D) To a high point above the fog filling the valley

4. What is done when a cold, wet camera is brought into a warm room?

• A) It is left to warm up slowly in its bag
• B) It is taken out of the bag at once and put in front of a heater
• C) The lens is removed
• D) The shoot carries on at once

Answers

1. B — As the rain thins and the mass of cloud pulls away, the low sun seeps onto the landscape through the gap.
2. C — When drops take light from behind they shine and stand out as lines or dots against the dark background.
3. D — Fog collects at the valley bottom; seen from a hill above it, it spreads like a sea.
4. A — Slow warming prevents warm, humid air from fogging up on cold surfaces.

Summary card

• Don't run from the rain, shelter and wait; a weather break is short.
• Against a dark sky, expose for the lit subject.
• To see rain, put the light behind, the dark background in front.
• On a foggy morning, choose knowingly between inside the fog and above it.
• Cover, hood, slow warming; if it thunders, leave; take into account wet skin's highlights and the raincoat's color.

Bridge to the next lesson

The wide frame shot at the weather break has the rocks, the clouds and the end of the rainbow, but what your friend really fixes on is something in the distance: a small patch on the opposite slope where the light falls on just a handful of pine trees, the trees lined up like a pattern on the dark slope. In the wide frame that patch is the size of a dot. Why photograph a landscape up close? The next lesson takes up picking out patterns, rhythms and overlapping layers from inside the landscape with a long lens.