Chilkat Mountains, Haines, Alaska – Image 2808

Haines has one of the most beautiful settings for any small town in the world. The combination of the ocean, the incredible mountain backdrop and the necklace of sparking lights strung along the waterfront takes your breath away. I shot this image in February while on assignment for an advertising agency that contracted me to do a winter tourism shoot. This was my first and only time I tried a digital technique called high dynamic range (HDR) that helps to expand the tonal range of an image. The eye can see something like nine stops of light while the camera sees only 3 to 4 stops. To help the camera record what the eye/brain can compute, I took multiple exposures of this image varying the shutter speeds creating over-exposure to under-exposures. In the computer, my digital imaging specialist,Terra, combined these images giving the full tonal range of what my eye saw. This image illustrates the month of December in my 2013 Southeast Alaska Calendar. Enjoy the photo and thanks for visiting. Camera body: D700, Lens: Nikkor 16-35mm f/4 /digital capture/ISO 100/tripod/long exposure © Mark Kelley