Much of Ontario is covered in forest, with some pretty incredible forests to be found in a lot of areas. While each type of forest has its own charm, I often find myself drawn to Cedar forests. The trees create some of the most amazing mazes of branches and dense canopy. That dense canopy means that under these trees, if they get big enough, it can be very dark. While a lack of light isn’t typically what a photographer is looking for in a subject, the darkness in here makes the few locations where light breaks through even more interesting. This particular tree is close to my home, and on my first visit to the location I realized that the light will come through these branches at such an angle to create a stunning blast of light over the ferns.
Recognizing this dynamic was only the first challenge – capturing a scene like this is very tricky. First, the area is naturally dark, so capturing a lot of detail means needing a longer shutter speed or accepting a bit lower quality. Unfortunately, a longer shutter speed isn’t always an option in an image like this, as the ferns are often moving in the wind, so they would often be blurry. Given the depth of the image, the scene would also require a focus stack, meaning you’d need to capture the same image more than once without anything moving to make it work. To add to the complexity, the sun moves surprisingly fast in the sky at this time of year, so seeing the light between the branches only happens for a few moments before you need to move to another spot to see the light. All of this adds up to needing to be efficient in capturing the image, and having a bit of luck with the breeze.
Regardless of the difficulties, I’m really happy with how this turned out in the end.