Waterscapes

On a recent photo field trip to Englishman River and Little Qualicum Falls on Vancouver Island BC, I had the opportunity to use a Variable ND filter for the first time. This was necessary to record visually, the incredible energy of the rivers in full spate, and illustrate their significance in the general landscape.
In order to 'understand' the fast moving water, I needed to use a variety of slow shutter speeds to capture the different shapes and textures in the turbulent currents.

By stopping down the aperture to almost the point of diffraction at f22, and lowering the ISO to 100, I was able to slow the shutter speeds down, giving the flowing water that classical 'velvety' appearance, without overexposing the image. But this underscored the tremendous majesty I felt from the river.
By using a Variable ND filter with a range between 2-8 stops, I was able to achieve slower shutter speeds, retain accurate color cast, and deepen the dynamic range as seen with the following images:

 

 

 

"In photography and optics, a neutral density filter or ND filter is a filter that reduces or modifies the intensity of all wavelengths or colors of light equally, giving no changes in hue of color rendition. It can be a colorless (clear) or grey filter. "