Taking pictures of sunsets is a lot of fun. This lake near Dallas is special to me because I lived in a little house on the top of the distant hill for a year when I was in seventh grade. My brother and me spent a lot of time together fishing out of a nine foot aluminum boat on this lake.
Taking great sunset pictures requires a lot of patience and a good tripod to keep your camera steady. The reason you need a good tripod is you will need to use a low shutter speed (I took this picture with a shutter speed of 4 which is 1/4 of a second) so if I was not using a tripod any little movement would blur the picture. I like to use a low ISO (I took this picture at 100 ISO) that way the picture will be very clear with no fuzziness which comes from using higher ISO settings. I would recommend setting your aperture anywhere between f/2.8-f/4 (I took this picture with an aperture of f/4) Once you set your ISO at 100 and your aperture between f/2.8-f/4 all you will have to do is change your shutter speed. If it's to bright adjust to a higher shutter speed and if it is too dark adjust to a lower shutter speed.
Here is a recap of the settings I like to use to take sunsets.
*With your camera on a tripod set your ISO to 100
*If you have a Nikon set the color mode to "Vivid" in screen menu with a camera icon.
*Set your aperture to f/2.8-f/4
*Start with a shutter speed around 80 (1/80th of a second).
*If the picture is to bright just adjust to a higher shutter speed.
*If the picture is to dark just adjust to a lower shutter speed.
*Even when you might think it is to dark to take, keep taking and adjust your shutter speed all they way down to a shutter speed of 1 and you will be surprised how the picture turns out.
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