Rainy-day magic
Don’t let inclement weather get in the way of your creative photography – use it as inspiration!
Think of weather as ‘good’ or ‘bad’, and you’ll be going wrong if you’re looking to capture the moods of the season. Damp days are just as viable as those with bright sunshine – and they may be even more rewarding, given that fewer photographers will be outside to explore the potential.
Weather conditions can inspire different creative approaches, too. A wet, leaf-strewn foreground, for example, can be used to set up a multiple-exposure image that combines two or three separate shots into one frame. Set up your camera on a tripod to lock it in position. Provided you don’t change the focus point or exposure settings, you can take several shots – introducing different elements into the frame – and blend the results together in layers in Photoshop.
Place a model in one position to achieve a balanced frame. After taking a shot, move them to another position to introduce a stronger narrative. After shooting this image, get them to move out of frame entirely, and shoot the empty scene. Because the camera hasn’t moved over the three different shots, they will all line up exactly in software as separate layers. Now, all you need to do is blend them together using Opacity or Blending Modes: artistic images can be created, with ghostly figures dominating the scene.