The vistas of the Danube in Budapest are listed as a Unesco World Heritage site, and who am I to argue? Kris and I spent hours walking though old Pest (and also got over to the Buda side for various attractions) and never got tired of looking at the river and its sights. It's a beautiful city, especially as the sun sets and the lights come on. Here's another view taken five days earlier, from the south. This is from the north.
I took this picture by setting the Nikon D800E on top of my gloves on a capstan on the river bank. (I've got to stop being so lazy and carry my tripod.) But, sometimes you have to improvise, no? Made a two second exposure at f/5.6, ISO 100, which smoothed the surface of the water beautifully. I increased the clarity and the contrast a bit, and lightened the sky just a hair to show the evening star, Venus, above the National Gallery on the hill. I then imported the image into Silver Efex 2 into the High Structure Smooth preset. From there, all I did was lower the color temp to -2, just to make it seem a bit colder. It was cold, btw. By this time, about -4 C.
And because I think the color version was nice, here it is, too.
For more info about the equipment and software I use, see this page.
I like the B&W version better, but yes, both are nice. The water was either very calm or you used a longer exposure…Beautiful!
Yes, Corinne. It was a two second exposure, which is about right here, I think. I was just guessing, and it was so cold with the wind rushing down the river that I didn’t feel like making too many exposures because my hands were about frozen.
Absolutely beautiful! Postcard-perfect!!!
You’re killing me! I have a friend living in Budapest and you’re making me want to GO!
Marybeth, it’s is indeed full of more beautiful cityscapes than anywhere we’ve been. And the food is good, too. Go!
Fantastic place, beautiful photo! The camera itself is one of the best machines…
Too bad the D800 doesn’t have the flip LCD screen that the D5100 has…
Congrats for your photo, again!
Yes, there are some times when I wish I had a flip out screen. But the D800 does have a mode that allows you to put the image on the rear screen instead of looking through the viewfinder. In fact, I used that here because the camera was set on a capstan at about shin level and getting down on the ground to look through the viewfinder was a pain. This instance was actually when I wish I could take off the prism head, like on old Nikon F cameras, and look directly down on the ground glass.
Beautiful photo! Way better than the ones I took with my iPhone, which was in the throes of a nervous breakdown. Fortunately, it held up for the entire trip.
Don’t diss the iPhone. I’ve taken a lot of nice photos with mine. This one would have been hard though, because I intentionally used a long shutter speed. Sometimes you just need all the control a DSLR will give you.