Help requested for Old Mill Photo

naturebyeric

Howdy folks

I've been meaning to check out the forums since joining smugmug last year and just getting around to it. I have a question on this photo that I took of an old mill in Clinton, NJ (center and western part of the state). To me the mill itself is not as sharp as I hoped it would be. I've got a new camera (Nikon D7000) that is quite a bit more to learn than my old D50 and its a new lens, Sigma 17-70 2.8-4. I got both back in January and haven't had much of a chance to really explore what they do and how to get them to do what I'd like.

This was a 4 second exposure, f/25, 26mm, ISO 100 (photo taken about an hour after sunrise on a lightly overcast day). I really enjoy waterfalls and river scenes such as this one and sometimes notice that while I can get the effect of smoothing out the water, other elements often appear soft or even blurred. Using auto focus, the point of focus was on the window that is just to the upper right of the wheel itself.

Any thoughts, comments, ideas for improvement are appreciated. I did minimal adjusting of the photo afterwards. If I recall, I added a little more warmth to it. I have another that is similar in the gallery http://naturebyeric.smugmug.com/Landscapes/NJ-Landscapes

eoren1

Welcome Eric
Nicely composed photo
As to the question of sharpness. The biggest factor is the aperture set at f/25. You have hit the diffraction limit of any lens at which you will start to find the entire scene losing focus. To get around that and still get multi-second exposures, the best answer is a neutral density filter that will allow you to shoot at f/8 and nail sharpness as well.
Other factors may be the quality of the tripod, whether you used mirror lockup or live view but the main issue here is diffraction.
There's a great thread somewhere on the forum about buying ND filters. I strongly suggest reading through that.
Hope that helps.

naturebyeric

Thanks Eyal! I was using a neutral density filter, though found it wasn't quite dark enough (ND 0.9) to get a long enough exposure. All I had left was a polarizing filter in that size. So perhaps those two together may have contributed to diffraction as well. My local camera shop didn't have NDs, so will have to order another one on my next order from B&H. I will search for and check out the ND forum thread as well.

eoren1

No problem
2filters.com is a great site
For middle of the day, nothing beats a 10-stop....but it'll set you back $100...