Shooting Challenge: 24 Awesome Reflections And Refractions

The response to this week’s shooting challenge has been massive! We’ve got everything from Aussie landscapes to door gunners in Afghanistan. Check out all these and more reader-submitted interpretations of reflections and refractions after the jump.

Click on each photo to see a bigger version.

Sandro Renda

Date Taken: 14 Jan 2010 – 12am
No Flash
Location – Kangaroo Point – Brisbane – Queensland.

Took this photo last year Mid Jan with my brother and a mate. We all did night shots of spots all over Brisbane CBD.
The shot was taken from Southbank/Kangaroo Point of the Brisbane Skyline at around mid night.
This is one of my first night shoots and I was fairly impressed. My mates had a better camera but too there wasnt too much of a difference between the two.
So putting in to this week’s challenge is the reflections on the water of the lights.

Michael Curtin

Camera Body: Nikon D90
Lens: Nikon 18-105mm f/3.5-5.6 VR
f-Stop: f9
Exposure: 1/160
ISO 200
Focal Length: 18mm

This is a photo I took when I was in China for my wedding; it was taken in Jinan city near Da Ming Lake. I took this relatively candid shot of a Grandfather and his Granddaughter/Grandson feeding the goldfish. I just thought it was a nice moment to have caught in such a great setting. The reflections in the pond from the foreground and also the background made me think of it for this challenge.

I really admire photographers who can go up to people and ask if they would like to be photographed; I still have yet to pluck up the courage. But I really do think having people in a shot makes it feel more natural and authentic. I was tossing up between a few others I took around the area but Grandpa sold me. Hope you like it!

Rimma Dinkin

This image was taken few years back

Camera: Canon PowerShot A2000 IS, f/3.2 ISO-80

What makes this shot memorable is that it was taken from Shinkansen (bullet train) at close to 250 Km/h and was a complete fluke. Hida region is not very touristy part of Japan, but twice a year there is a beautiful festival in Takayama and a nature on the way there speaks for itself http://www.jnto.go.jp/eng/attractions/event/traditionalevents/a54_fes_takayama.html

Keats Family

During a stage production by my children, this mirror-ball caught my eye.

The refractions coming off all those mirrors looked quite cool 🙂

Nikon D3s – 70-200AF-s VR @ 170mm
ISO 800
Shutter 1/160
Aperture 2.8
No Flash

Prashant Waitha

This photo was taken by the lake in Lazienki Park, Warsaw (Poland). My girlfriend and I went on a trip around Poland, we went to Warsaw, Gdansk and Sopot. It was quite a tiring trip as we had to take a two hour train from her home town to Krakow and from there an overnight 5 hour train to Warsaw. We slept on the train for 3 nights before returning to her home town and I reckon so far on this holiday I have spent close to, if not over 50 hours on a train. I have been overseas for 6 weeks.
We walked around Warsaw for the whole day before ending up in this park, it is the biggest park I have been in and I have been to the Botanical gardens in Sydney and Melbourne. There was a beautiful mansion behind me also. We were very scared when we decided to walk back to the train station from the park as it took us 20 minutes just to get from the lake to the street. As you can see from this picture it was already getting dark and to make it worse there were tall trees lining the paths and bordering the park and no lights within the park, only on the outskirts.
This photo was taken with a Sony Cybershot DSC-HX5 point and shoot camera, ISO1600 and setting was intelligent auto.

Tom Giuretis

Camera/shot details:
Canon G9
f/4
1/60sec
ISO80

Story:
I have an obsession with Russia. Particularly Moscow. Particularly Red Square. This was taken on my third and most recent visit to that phenomenal city, in July this year. Red Square is photogenic at all times of the day, but I had never seen water pool in the cobblestones on which people walk, but rarely admire. The water is evaporating, much like the Soviet ideals of times gone by. Note the Western styles, and the young boy smiling? Russia is on the mend, and it’s beautiful to see. The photo itself was difficult to take, as the water trailed off behind me, but I had to get low enough to get the reflection, as the G9 doesn’t have an articulating screen. In the end I was on my knees, with the water perilously close to my crotch. I got many looks, and I was just hoping that the ever-present мили́ция (Militsiya – police) didn’t think I was urinating on their still-sacred Красная площадь (Krasnaya Ploshchad – Red Square).

Victor Osoianu

Equipment: iPhone 4
Settings: Auto, HDR
Technique: Wait for the right moment, point and shoot

Story: Shot was taken on the beautiful Trinity Beach, Cairns. Was about 5.30AM and the sun was rising right in front of our hotel balcony, so I decided to head down to the beach and enjoy the view. In moments like these you wish you had a proper DSLR camera to fully capture the moment, but I was extremely grateful I had my good-old iPhone 4.

Julien Klettenberg

Originally shot from my window in Tromsø, Norway, on a Canon IXUS 860 (ISO 80, f/5.6, 1/160), on 10 August 2008. It’s been cropped, and had Alien Skin’s “Exposure” applied to it, but otherwise it’s pretty much as shot. In summer in Tromsø, the sun never really sets, and a warm day is 14C. It’s the world’s most northerly city (well above the Arctic Circle), and I hope to return there soon.

Sean Mehonoshen

This was taken on board a US Blackhawk over Uruzgan province in Afghanistan on a cold January day. I was freezing cold and tired of snapping the empty countryside so I took a few shots of the door gunner instead.

It was taken on a Canon s90 set to auto and exposure bumped up a little, which resulted in 1/60 shutter, f3.2 aperture.

Sam Karagiannis

Shooting Summary:

Camera: Olympus E30
Lens: Olympus Zuiko 35mm Macro
Focal Length: 35mm
Shutter Speed: 1/400
F/3.5
ISO:200

Description:
I have shot a similar photo of the cat, with an old Olympus E300, where you could see his eyelashes reflecting in his eye, today, he was outside, and i thought perfect opportunity to get a reflection of grass.

Got the camera out, 150 shots and a VERY angry cat afterwards, i got this one, you can see the grass in his eyes.

I hope you all enjoy this, i was trying to get him to drink water, and get the reflection of the water drop, but you can lead a horse to water……

No Post processing done at all.

Shirley Stanford

this is a crocodile lying dead still in the water reflecting the fence in its enclosure at Hartleys Creek Crocodile farm near PortDouglas Qld. The croc handler here unfortunately was one of our brave soldiers who have died in Afganistan.
canon 20D
f/11
1/1000 sec
800 ISO
300mm lens
taken 23/8/07

Ron Joosten

This photo was taken at Beauty Point in Tasmania using a 1967 Minolta SRT101 35mm film camera fitted with an 80-200mm Tamron zoom lens – I really love my old film cameras. The print was then scanned using an AGFA Duoscan. It was a misty morning and I just loved the colours reflected in the water, I just thought that this funny little work boat was so unusual that I had to get a photo of it. I had to spend about half an hour walking up and down the shore adjacent to the moorings before I was able to get a photo without any other boats in the shot.

Tim Pontin

Photo Details –
Canon 400D
F 9.5
ISO 400
+0.5 exposure bias
Aperture priority

I planned a photography trip with a good friend with the intention of trying some star trails, so we drove an hour out of the city to Yanchep National Park to avoid light pollution. As any good photographer does, got there very early to scope things out, and was lucky enough to score a perfectly still and clear afternoon and sunset. While walking the lake to find our locations, just snapped off a few shots of these ducks, and although I got some nice colourful sunset shots and others, there’s something about how simple this image is that I really like. Hope you enjoy 🙂

Mohammed Abdullah

Shooting summary:
Camera model: Nikon COOLPIX S6
F-stop : f/8.5
Exposure time: 1/148 s
ISO : 200
Exposure bias : +0.3 step
Focal length : 6mm
Flash mode : No flash
Story behind this shot:
It was one good day for outdoor activities (rarely get this in Hobart and it was on 23/07/11), while waiting for fish to eat our bait, I grab my camera and snap some reflection shots, to kill my boredom(been fishing there for 4-hours and my mates getting fish but not for me, bad day for huh! ). Came out this is one of best shot(although with old camera some noise visible) I captured. Never thought that the reflection of tree and the cloud will be visible on the water.

Paul Porihis

I found this fantastic little tea shop on Mt Dandenong in Victoria that had a character to it that made me curious enough to want to take a few shots inside.
After i had taken some shots with the cameras, i kept walking past a pot on display in the tea shop that had a great “fisheye” reflection of the adjacent shelves and i kept looking at it as i walked past. After a while i eventually stopped, thought “why not” and took a random not-so-serious self portrait from it.

Camera: DMC-GF1
Lens: 20mm f1.7 Pancake
Shutter: 1/30
Aparture: f1.7
ISO: 200

Harry Smiles

Pentax K-r
Pentax DA 16-45mm (16mm)
ISO 200
1/60 sec at f11
-7/10 EV
Noise reduced and levels in Lightroom 3

I’ve been meaning to try and get a decent picture of our dam since I moved in a year ago, but never got around to it. When I saw the challenge this week I thought that might make a good shot, and gave me a push as well. There was no wind at all so the dam was perfectly still and gave some nice clear reflections of the trees silhouetted against the setting sun.

Karthik Ramaswamy

I call this “Up is Down”. Not original, however, apt I suppose.

I shot this at Stanwell Tops. From the edge of the cliff all I could see was a perfect straight line – the Horizon, separating the water from the air. A perfect blend of the sky and the sea.

Shot from my Sony DSC HX5 with intelligent auto.

David Schokker

This is a shot I took when in New Zealand. This is a photo of the Franz Josef Glacier in the South Island.
After about an hour of hiking on foot around one of the many walking paths, I found a still pond with some really good reflections.

The photo was taken with a Cannon 400D.
Exposure: 1/60 sec
F-stop: f/5.6
ISO: 100
Focal Length @ 28mm

Shame about only 1 entry, I spent 2 months in NZ and took about 3000 photos, many with reflections.

Kelvin Benignus

Used a Nikon D5000 with Nikon AF-S Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 IF ED @ 1/500 sec f/2.8 iso 320 70mm. This photo was taken during a Terry Fox Run 2010. The marathon is about running against cancer. It was started in Canada by a man called Terry Fox. He had cancer, and wanted to raise money for cancer patient. He planned to run across Canada, but died before completing it. However, he wanted people to continue his cause and until today he is a very famous and iconic person in Canada. The picture here , taken by a puddle of water by the road somewhat reflect the different expression of the runners. Some were enthusiastic, while some shows signs of fatigue and pain. These are what some cancer patient feels. Some are positive in overcoming it, while others are tired and are in pain.

Daina Peet

I took this photo with my Canon Digital IXUS 110 IS. I set a blank white sheet of paper on my desk and filled a glass with water and green cordial. I hung a torch directly above the glass of cordial. I lifted the glass about 1.5cm off the desk and let the reflection come through the bottom of the glass.

The ISO Speed was 800
The f-stop was f/2.8
The exposure time was 1/20 sec.
The focal length was 5mm
I did not use a flash in this photograph.

Matthew Wu

Camera: Nikon D7000
Lens: Nikkor 10.5mm f/2.8G Fisheye
Aperture: F/14
Shutter speed: 129″
ISO: 100
Exposure compensation: +1 EV

I was in the same spot a few months ago with a friend, and we saw the sun just settling below the Harbour Bridge with a bright orange glow. I tried to re-create that moment last Sunday, but unfortunately luck was not on my side as the clouds were blocking the settling sun ~ that would’ve made the image perfect. But alas, that’s landscape photography for you 🙂

I love this view because the first thing most people think of when Sydney is mentioned, is either the iconic Sydney Harbour Bridge or the Opera House, and I like to believe that this photo exemplifies the beauty of one of the most beautiful places on Earth.

Tom Shao

This photo was taken from the Jetty of my mate’s place on the Gold Coast. A spectacular view of one of the tallest residential buildings in the world.
Shot using:
D7000
17-55mm 2.8G Lens, (My fav lens)
f/6.3 with a shutter speed of 15seconds.
On Vivid colour setting with +2 saturation.

Lukas Cervenan

this image was taken at La Perouse a while before sunset.
I used my old camera Canon 450D, lens Canon EF 17-40mm f/4.0 L, ISO 100, custom WB and cokin filter.

We just went for a walk with my sister and when I saw this place, that pool and reflection in it, I just had to sit down and take this image;)

Will Lawler

D7000
28mm f/2.8 lens at
1/125 f/2.8 ISO1100

This was taken at a masquerade party when there was a lot of interesting things to shoot, including a laser show and a smoke machine. However I found the colours of these candles on the window sill and their reflection to be pretty interesting.