These are baobab trees in silhouette at sunset. I photographed them in Botswana. The flare from the sun is natural; I didn’t use any filters. Shooting into the sun, even when it’s diminished at sunrise and sunset, can be tricky because an accurate exposure is dependent on a large middle toned area in the composition. The brilliant hotspot can thwart the accuracy of the reading depending on 1) where the sun is placed in the frame, 2) the focal length of the lens, and 3) objects that may obscure the sun such as thin clouds or tree branches. The sun’s influence on the meter is reduced when it is far from the center of the frame, when a wide angle lens is used (because the sun appears much smaller), and if some natural object obscures the sun. Using the LCD screen or the viewfinder, we can now tweak our exposures to be perfect even before we shoot. This is a remarkable advance in mirrorless cameras. My settings for this shot were 1/640, f/14, and 500 ISO. I used a 24-105mm lens for the picture.
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