A beautiful golden sunset near Walgreens. You can almost see the sign at the bottom in the shadows.
Fujifilm FinePix A360, 1/145, F4.2, 12.6mm, ISO64, 2005-10-05T18:57:54-04, 2005-10-05_18h57m54
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.
A vivid pink sunset from September 2005, heavily edited. At the time I believed editing produced “fake” photos but now I know better. 
Fujifilm FinePix A360, 1/21, F2.8, 5.8mm, ISO100, 2005-09-09T19:50:41-04, 2005-09-09_19h50m41
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.
I shot this sunset from the backseat while my friend was driving. This is on West International Speedway Boulevard right near Daytona State College in Daytona Beach, Florida, USA.
On the left is the rear-view mirror and at the bottom you see the windshield wipers. That’s why I’m titling this Driving Sunset.
I cloned out a big electronic sign at the bottom-right. It was the college’s sign, but it was bright blue and annoying. You can still see the clone marks if you brighten the photo considerably, but no one will notice normally.
Canon Rebel XTi, EF 50mm 1:1.4, 1/500, F3.2, 50mm, ISO100, 2009-10-15T18:53:32-04, 20091015-225332rxt
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.
A beautiful golden sunset right before sundown.
I shot this right down my street. There were power lines blocking the way, so I walked in someone’s yard to cut them out of the shot. Some woman yelled “get off my property” at me as I was shooting this, so I tripped the shutter quickly and then walked off.
I put contrast at +100% in Adobe Camera Raw 5.0 and then used the curves tool to push it even further. Even though I pushed the exposure bias down to -1.33, I think I was in the wrong metering mode so the clouds in the middle are over-exposed: they are at (255,255,255) (8-bit) and there is no detail there. Nothing I can do about that… It’s not a big problem in this photo because you expect the sun to be bright.
I pushed a lot of stuff to black with the curves tool, such as the trees and houses below. They aren’t important… no reason for you to see them.
There is a lot of black and empty space in this image. You can do that. The subject does not have to be big and in the center. In fact, it’s often …
I shot this on an evening walk in my neighborhood. The sunset and white car paired well in my eyes.
I brightened the car and darkened the sunset in Photoshop for balance. The car was much darker than the sunset, but I was able to bring the colors out since I always shoot RAW. The files are 10MB each, which is a lot bigger than JPEGs, but it’s worth it for creative flexibility.
This was my first outing with the XTi kit lens in a long time. Because it’s EF-S and goes down to 18mm, it has a much wider field of view than my EF 28-135mm lens, which I enjoyed.
Canon Rebel XTi, EFS 18-55mm, 1/60, F3.5, 18mm, ISO100, 2009-10-10T18:31:03-04, 20091010-223103rxt
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After the sun went down, the clouds still looked great. Shot this last Friday, 2009-09-04, from the car.
Canon Rebel XTi, EF 28-135mm, 1/200, F3.5, 28mm, ISO800, 2009-09-04T19:40:41-04, 20090904-234041rxt
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A sunset near the dump in Orange City, FL. The clouds were quite dark with sunrays peeking through below. I think it looks nice, ominous too. 
Canon Rebel XTi, EF 28-135mm, 1/1600, F3.5, 28mm, ISO100, 2009-08-24T18:16:07-04, 20090824-221607rxt
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.
Looking back at a sunset on a busy road from a moving van. The road is Nova Road in Ormond Beach, Florida (could be county or Holly Hill, not sure). The colors really caught my eye. The setting is less than ideal, but it’s the best I could muster as the sunset faded quickly.
I added a lot of contrast and some vignetting. After using curves, I toned down the saturation with the sponge manually in the areas that were too bright to print.
Canon PowerShot SD790 IS, 1/60, F2.8, 6.2mm, ISO160, 2009-07-01T20:33:10-04, 20090702-003310rxt
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.
Sunset on the highway at dusk. Into the dark clouds…
The cloud formations caught my eye. There are dark clouds across the whole sky, with sunshine underneath. This was right near dusk, so I had to hold the camera still with a 1/30 second shutter speed at ISO400.
For editing, I added some contrast, darkened the corners, and toned down the clouds that were over-saturated from adding contrast in an RGB colorspace. This one is fairly grainy.
Leave me some comments, loyal readers / viewers.
Canon Rebel XTi, EF 28-135mm, 1/30, F4, 47mm, ISO400, 2008-11-14T17:47:49-05, 20081114-224749rxt1
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.
The dishes are washed and the kitchen is closed. This was lit by a beautiful sunset outside my door. It was at dusk when I shot this, but I balanced the camera on the counter for a 2.5-second exposure to give the sensor enough light.
What goes on around the sunset is often a lot more interesting than the sunset itself. Or the solar eclipse, or full moon, or the big thunderstorm. Take shots of everything, or take shots of something and focus on it. Usually for me, the first shot I take of an object or scene is the best, and then it goes downhill as I tweak and experiment with different angles. So trust your instincts.
This shot is wide-angle (18mm). It seemed better than backing up and going telephoto.
Canon Rebel XTi, EFS 18-55mm, 2.5″, F3.5, 18mm, ISO100, 2008-10-09T19:01:34-04, 20081009-230134rxt
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Credit me as Richard X. Thripp and link here.
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| Current: $172.71 | ||
