With the temperature gradually rising, last Friday I headed up to Mount Royal in the hope of getting some shots of the spring thaw. I was not to be disappointed and the stream at the Peel street entrance was in full flow.

I came prepared with my tripod and the 10 stop ND filter to take some long exposures in order to blur the cascading waterfalls.

Spring melt on Mount Royal
ISO 200 – 18mm – f9 – 4 secs

Stream at Peel Street entry to Mount Royal
ISO 200 – 18mm – f11 – 15 sec

The only problem with doing long exposures in order to have the water blurred is that people that pass through the frame either are not registered or appear as ghosts. This can sometimes be an advantage and can be a nice effect, but on this occassion I really wanted to have some persons in the shot.

To achieve this I took a long exposure to get the blurred water and then removed the ND filter to capture some people passing by. I then composited the shots in Photoshop Elements to arrive at the final result below.

Composited long and short exposure shots
ISO 200 – 18mm – f11 – 1/100 & 8 sec

I came across a great photographer Kiyoung Choi from South Korea on Google +. Kiyoung merges a simple clean title and date to his images – well worth checking out his work. Without wanting to plagiarise Kiyoung’s style, I nevertheless wanted to give it a go.

Thaw
ISO 200 – 18mm – f11 – 15 sec

Another long and short exposure composite image from slightly further up the path…

Out for a spring jog
ISO 200 – 18mm – f10 – 1/200 & 4 secs

Having seen how much water was flowing down the stream, I knew of a place not far from the large staircase that leads to the Kondiaronk Belvédère where there would be some nice cascading water.

Waterfall on Mount Royal
ISO 200 – 18mm – f10 – 13 secs

At the top of the waterfall is a bridge and since I was a bit short on time, I decided to climb up the incline. Since it was still a bit icy and hard to find good footholds and being pretty steep in places it probably took me longer to take this direct route up the mountain than if I had taken the more sensible route via the path. At least I didn’t get stuck (or fall) and need to be rescued.

Waterfall on Mount Royal
ISO 200 – 24mm – f8 – 13 secs

Waterfall under the bridge
ISO 200 – 18mm – f7.1 – 5 secs

Looking down you can just make out downtown Montreal through the trees.

Waterfall above Montreal
ISO 200 – 18mm – f9 – 8 secs

A little further up stream is another ‘bridge’ but the stream was more over than under this one.

Spring thaw on Mount Royal
ISO 200 – 18mm – f7.1 – 5 secs

Thanks for stopping by. Until next time.

– Martin

Montréal in Pictures

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