Cadman Lane Sunset

Clearing skies this evening suggested a reasonable sunset.  I ummed and ahed for a while then quickly headed out to a local green lane to capture the last of the light.  This wheat field will soon start to turn a golden hue but at the moment it is still verdant.  An old trick of toning down the sun by placing a tree in the way, this also needed three stops of ND filtration for the sky as well as another stop from the bottom, overlapping the sky filtration to provide 4 stops along the horizon.  Even then I had blown highlights and some loss of shadow detail so I bracketed and created an HDR.

I still feel uncomfortable with this technique as it is difficult to expect people to accept the image as realistic.  It is one of the difficulties of shooting contre jour at the beginning and end of the day.