Sunset at Neuse River Trail Sunflowers

Nikon D5300 + Sigma 10-20mm + Manfrotto 055PROB + Trigger Trap + LR + PS    Manual Mode | 1/10sec | f/9 | ISO100 | @10mm

​Photos By: Glennboi Photography
​www.glennboi.com

It was an award of waiting game at last! As a saying goes "Patience Is A Virtue". It was a bad weather for the past days here in Raleigh last week, most of the afternoon, either cloudy or raining most in the afternoon. This is just a 15 mins drive away from where I stayed. Every afternoon after my day job, I should look at the sky and hoping for a good weather, before finally the sunflowers will be gone this year and finally answered prayers last Friday. I saw a good formation in the clouds and the sun is perfect! I had to rush to the place and I arrived 1.5hrs. ahead of this very beautiful sunset.
​
Within my waiting until the sundown, I should look for a good spot, good angle where I should position my tripod, composition and find a good background and foreground. My challenges are the people who also amazed of the beautiful sunset, with their phone. This would be our big challenges now a day! I also had another worry in mind, while I was standing in the middle of the garden with 3-5ft high sunflowers, is the snake! It was reported that there was some snake in the area a few days ago, and one of the visitors was bitten, I had my eyes 360° looking down if some stranger visitor around me :( and, I must uncomplainingly wait until those people will be clear out of my viewfinder, but I already took some images on my foreground with an overexposure to have some lights. Then finally just before the sun disappears, I completed the whole image with a clear path from those photographers in front of me.
 
I took around 20 shoots with different exposure, the last frame has been almost totally dark with just a little sun glow in my image with 1/500 shutter speed. I started taking pictures at 1/5 shutter speed with a total over exposed in my sky but a good exposure for my foreground. I set my aperture at fixed f/9, with my lowest ISO100.
​
Since the picture was taken for a few minutes with the little wind, my post processing was manually layer mask on different layers since the auto blend (HDR) will not work for this image when your subjects are not stationary. Finally, I had this best stunning sunset in the sunflower garden. Till next year!


Gears Used:
Camera: Nikon 5300
Lens: Sigma 10-20mm
Tripod: Manfrotto 055PROB
​Trigger: iPhone+TriggerTrap
Post Processing: Adobe Ligthroom and Photoshop