Beginner Creamy water effect

[JD007F]

Evening guys,

I've never taken any photos of waterfalls and or water but I'm off to Iceland in January and looking to get some good snaps out there. I had a little practise and play today but I didn't have a tripod with me which was a little silly. If you could point me in the right direction I popped to a local dam to give it ago. Hope they aren't to bad[emoji85]

 

[KernowChris]

Speaking as a 'beginner' myself, I'm going to guess that without a tripod it wasn't a very long exposure and you didn't make use of any kind of 'nd filter' to prolong the exposure. To get the best effect, that's really what you need to use.

Without an nd filter I've managed to get some reasonable results on dull days, the aperture shut right down and with a polarising filter to help reduce the light a bit more but it doesn't produce the greatest results.

 

[realspeed]

i have mentioned before I am not in favour of making water have that creamy look but understand others do. I think you can have a far better effect by "freezing" moving water so one can see the droplets etc. Yes I am in a minority I know, so all I will say it is down to personal taste

 

[john.margetts]

Using very long exposures of water with a nd filter just turns the water to blank white - pointless. To get life in the water without turning it to glass, you just need longish exposures. A few seconds or so should be plenty. If in doubt, err on the side of shorter exposures.

 

[Ms_Tex]

i have mentioned before I am not in favour of making water have that creamy look but understand others do. I think you can have a far better effect by "freezing" moving water so one can see the droplets etc. Yes I am in a minority I know, so all I will say it is down to personal taste

I'm up in the air about water, but I'm more or less on your side of this. Most of the time I like to see only a little blur in flowing water because that's what my eye normally sees (but I understand the appeal of "creaminess" of flowing water). I think the first photo would look better with the water "frozen" to show detail, but I'm okay with the amount of blur the water has in the second photo.