Harbor Under Fog

One last image from my harbor outing back in May.

As I was heading back to the car, the fog was starting to roll over the harbor in broken chunks. The moving breaks in the fog created the nice gradation of light you see in this image.

Also, the white balance was a big key in editing these photos. Most of the light sources in this shot, particularly the light from Santa Barbara illuminating the glow in the sky, are very orange. If you look at the original image with auto white balance, it's overwhelmingly orange.

I shot these in RAW and brought the color temperature way down to turn the orange glow into a cool blue. The original white balance is probably much truer to what my eyes saw that night, but I think the blue just has a much better atmosphere.

I've learned that the white balance can have a huge impact on your night photography. If your images are coming back with an orangish-brown sky, try bringing down the color temperature and--poof!--you'll have a blue night sky. (Or, when you're out there, try shooting with your camera's "tungsten" white balance mode).

The original, unedited image.

Another image from that evening. I didn't like how it turned out enough to put it at the front of my photostream, but I thought it was at least a cool idea.