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How to Photograph Waterfalls • Landscape Photography
• Wildlife Photography
BY NASIM MANSUROV | 54 COMMENTS
LAST UPDATED ON AUGUST 2, 2023 • Portraiture
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• Advanced Tutorials
In this article, I will share some tips on photographing waterfalls and hopefully
teach you how to take advantage of your camera gear when photographing
moving water. While it seems like a simple task, taking pictures of waterfalls and
making the water look silky smooth can be a little challenging, especially if you VOTE
do not have the right equipment. Although it is certainly possible to capture On Our Next Lens Reviews
waterfalls with your camera hand-held, your best bet would be to use a stable
tripod in order to allow for very slow shutter speeds without introducing camera
shake.

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Table of Contents
1. Your Goal – Slow Shutter Speed
2. Use a Tripod
3. Use the Lowest ISO
4. Stop Down / Change Aperture to a Larger Number NIGHT SKY PORTRAIT
5. Use a Neutral Density Filter PHOTOGRAPHY PHOTOGRAPHY

6. Use Wide-angle and Telephoto Lenses

1. Your Goal – Slow Shutter Speed

In order to make the water look smooth, you need to use an extremely slow STREET PHOTOGRAPHY
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shutter speed of several seconds or longer. Slow shutter speeds create the
“ghosting” effect, making the subject appear smooth and blurry, which is exactly
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what you want. Fast shutter speeds only freeze the running water, making the
scene look too ordinary. Here is an image of falls that I captured with a relatively
fast shutter speed of 1/250th of a second:

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Now take a look at a waterfall that I captured at 5 seconds:

NIKON D750 + 24mm f/1.4 @ 24mm, ISO 50, 5 sec, f/11.0

The image looks more dramatic and the silky water looks more appealing and
pleasing to the eye.

2. Use a Tripod
If you want to capture moving water and make it look smooth and soft, you need
to use a tripod, because it is not possible to hand-hold a camera without
introducing camera shake when using extremely slow shutter speeds. While you
could set your camera on a stone or some other object, you would still be limited
by how much you can move and what part of the waterfall you could capture. If
you do not yet have a tripod, I highly recommend getting one as soon as possible
– I recently wrote a detailed guide on how to choose and buy a tripod, which will
hopefully help you with the selection process.

3. Use the Lowest ISO

Once you set your camera on a tripod, you need to continue working on
decreasing your shutter speed. Lowing the camera ISO to the smallest value
such as ISO 100 not only increases image quality, but also decreases the shutter
speed. For example, decreasing camera ISO from ISO 800 to 100 on a DSLR
decreases the shutter speed by three full stops, so if you were shooting at
1/200th of a second, you would end up with a shutter speed to 1/25th of a
second.

4. Stop Down / Change Aperture to a Larger Number

Stopping down, or increasing the f/ number, decreases the amount of light that
passes through the lens. If your shutter speed is too high, try changing the
aperture to a larger number like f/11 or even f/16, if necessary. Changing aperture
is the last thing you can try on your camera, if you do not want to spend the
money on a good ND filter (see below).

NIKON D700 @ 27mm, ISO 100, 1/2, f/22.0

5. Use a Neutral Density Filter

If you have already tried decreasing your camera ISO to the lowest number and
you have already adjusted your aperture to the largest f/ number and you still
cannot get to multiple seconds of exposure, it means that you are most likely
shooting in bright-day conditions and there is still too much light entering
through the lens. The only way to decrease the amount of light going through the
lens, is to use a filter in front of the lens that blocks a large portion of incoming
light. “ND” or “Neutral Density” filters are specifically designed for this purpose –
to only let a small amount of light into the lens in order to decrease the camera
shutter speed. There are many different types of Neutral Density filters out there
and most of them differ by the amount of light they let through. I personally use
the B+W 77mm ND 1.8 and B+W 77mm ND 3.0 circular filters.

Most ND filters have a number at the end that says something like “ND 0.3” or
“ND 1.8”. These numbers represent the amount of light the filter stops. For
example, an “ND 0.3” filter would block one stop of light, while an “ND 1.8” would
block 6 stops of light. What do these stops mean? Let’s say you changed your
ISO to 100, changed your aperture to f/16 and you still have a fast shutter speed
of 1/250th of a second. If you use the “ND 0.3” filter, your shutter speed will drop
to 1/125th of a second. If you use the “ND 3.0” filter, your shutter speed would
drop all the way to 4 seconds, transmitting only about 0.1% of light! That’s a big
change from 1/250th of a second freezing water action to a silky-smooth water
with just one filter.

6. Use Wide-angle and Telephoto Lenses

Take both wide-angle and telephoto zoom lenses to photograph waterfalls. High
and powerful waterfalls can release plenty of moisture into the air, which might
land on the front of your lens or even potentially damage your equipment. Use a
telephoto lens such as Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8G VR II to photograph falls from a
distance and a wide-angle lens such as Nikon 16-35mm f/4.0 VR if the falls are
smaller and you are standing close to them.

Bridge Falls

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TAGGED WITH: HOWTO, LANDSCAPE PHOTOGRAPHY, PHOTOGRAPHY TIPS, TIPS FOR BEGINNERS

About Nasim Mansurov

Nasim Mansurov is the author and founder of Photography Life,
based out of Denver, Colorado. He is recognized as one of the
leading educators in the photography industry, conducting workshops,
producing educational videos and frequently writing content for Photography
Life. You can follow him on Instagram and Facebook. Read more about Nasim
here.

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54 COMMENTS Newest

Colebag7mc
April 19, 2024 9:17 am

What are lovely article well written. I’m a total novice so this stepped me through the process
nicely. Thank you.
I shall try it out tomorrow

0 Reply

Moji
May 5, 2022 2:39 pm

Or if you are a Pentax user, don’t worry. Take your APS-C camera with the 18-55 WR, or Your
FF camera with 28-105 WR. They all are safe to be used very close to waterfalls. I live in
Norway, and here we have a very interesting waterfall where you can walk back of it, and
photograph it from behind.

-1 Reply

Stephanie
May 16, 2021 2:38 pm

Nice article but you didn’t mention circular polarizers which are MUCH more important for
waterfall photography than ND filters. ND usually isn’t needed unless you want an
excessively long exposure (which doesn’t look good anyway) or are photographing in poor
light. Polarizers though are a must to reduce shiny glare on wet rock.

0 Reply

Mark Schmerling
Reply to Stephanie March 17, 2022 10:51 am

I’m in agreement. Circular polarizing filters, which I constantly use, also reduce glare on
the water itself, and on the foliage. It defies “common “logic,” but overcast conditions are
best for any kind of moving stream photography. Thank you.

1 Reply

Henry
December 9, 2020 11:58 pm

Great tips for the new amateur. photographers.

0 Reply

Betsy
November 1, 2020 8:34 am

Thank you for sharing your wisdom, most helpful and easy to understand.

0 Reply

Rick
July 14, 2020 1:44 pm

Great help, I plan to go to the water falls this weekend, I will practice your help. I have a Nikon
d500 plus my main lenses will be Tokina 11-16, or my a Tamron 150-600 G2 . Rick

0 Reply

Rajesh
October 13, 2017 11:44 pm

Hi sir we know both nd and gnd can stop light from entering to the camera, hence prevent
over exposed area. My question is at the same time is it reduce light from a proper exposed
part of a scene resulting under exposed or darken more if any part of the scene is already
under exposed?

0 Reply

Ajay Parikh
August 4, 2017 11:35 pm

Nice explanation in detail specially with reference to water fall,soon going to shoot hope to
get good result.

-2 Reply

Susan
June 3, 2017 5:26 pm

Hello,
Thank you for the tutorial! I cannot afford the nice camera and lens you’ve recommended…
would a Nikon 55-200mm f/4-5.6G VR II DX AF-S ED Zoom lens work??

0 Reply

Russell Shepphard
May 7, 2017 9:23 pm

Nasim,

Great advice for shooting waterfalls. You mentioned to use the lowest ISO setting and also to
use a wide aperture. How will this affect other aspects of the images, such as trees and
brush that may be in the photo. Will the low ISO, shutter speed, and tripod help to freeze the
movement of the other elements in the photo? Thanks for taking the time to read and reply
to my questions.

0 Reply

Dave
Reply to Russell Shepphard May 14, 2017 10:37 am

I always shoot waterfalls with ISO 100 (smallest on my camera). With a wide aperture
(small f number), you’re going to need a faster shutter speed. The effect is that the
water won’t be as silky as with a smaller aperture, but your tree leaves and brush won’t
be blurry from wind (which is very important to me). Another factor coming into play with
a wider aperture is the narrower depth of field, which can cause more of your photo to
be out of focus, so you have to also take that into account as well.

I like the medium to smaller apertures to give me more of a silky water effect (compared
to the wider apertures), and then I watch the leaves to snap the shot when there is little
movement from wind. Best time to shoot waterfalls: (1) cloudy, so there is not too much
dynamic range, and (2) no wind, so you can get the silky water effect while still
minimizing motion blur in trees/brush.

I also always bring filters with me: ND filters (usually 3 stop is good) to slow the shutter
speed even more, or a polarizer if the waterfall has a pool at the bottom. The polarizer
can be adjusted to greatly reduce surface glare in the pool. The polarizer also gives you
a slightly slower shutter speed, usually from 1-2 stops depending on the quality of the
filter.

1 Reply

Mark Schmerling
Reply to Russell Shepphard March 17, 2022 10:58 am

Small apertures (go as small as possible; I usually use F22) help maintain a look of
sharpness from the foreground through the background. For best results, try focusing on
a a tree or rock some 4-6 feet in front of the lens, or use hyperfocal focusing, which is
lens and aperture specific, but produces similar results, when used with manual
focusing. Agreed with most recommendations, but I use a circular polarizing filter, to
reduce glare on water, foliage, and on wet rocks.

0 Reply

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