Rain as Supplementary Lenses

You may need to take several photos, so that the rain bokeh is not covering any important subject. Photograph/Anshul Dutt

The rains are almost coming to an end, but before this monsoon completely gets over, it is best to try some optical tricks with water droplets. When you are using a very wide lens, even droplets that have settled on the lens can look interesting. If there is water on the lens and you choose to focus on a subject that is a fair distance away, the raindrops themselves, are rendered out of focus.

Due to this, they will take the shape of the aperture blade of your lens. Whether that’s circular or hexagonal, you have found yourself an interesting pattern!

You can get a slightly similar effect by firing the flash, such that it only illuminates the rain that is falling a little in front of the lens. Just turn the power of the flash down, so that it does not influence the rest of your scene.

When making a shot of this nature, it is important to remember that the effect should not be all that there is to the picture. An interesting subject or activity in the background is also vital.

This article originally appeared in the August 2014 issue of Better Photography.

— Anshul Dutt