I think I took the photo from that angle since that was where the flag was billowing such that I could catch the dragon. Easter monday with 20 tourists in my way and an impatient friend getting cold, as you say constrains the time and composition! Ad astra per aspera
When color came along, hanging a red filter in front of the lens seemed especially pointless. Happily for my father, the polarizing filter had just gone on sale when he made his first serious moves to color. And it works MUCH better than a colored filter anyway--it doesn't do anything about the water in the air, but it does make it possible so the light the humidity is reflecting doesn't show up in your picture.
His nature photography lenses had their own polarizing filters that almost never came off. And you don't CAN turn them "off" if they start causing problems like eliminating the reflections on the surface of water, for example. "Remember the I35W bridge--who needs terrorists when there are Republicans"
I still use red and yellow filters on B&W film: these are the black and white days!
As for making the surface of water disappear--that is a known hazard of polarization. I knew a guy who almost killed himself landing an airplane on a lake--turns out he was breaking in a new pair of polarized flying glasses and the word had not yet spread about some of polarization's drawbacks. With the lens filter, of course, you just rotate the front glass 90° and you are back to the "real" world. "Remember the I35W bridge--who needs terrorists when there are Republicans"
So I have spent some time collecting strategies for getting the best pictures under the circumstance. And of course, the best strategy is to go out with your camera when the light is most likely to be good. Unfortunately, many photogenic sites are closed during golden hour. "Remember the I35W bridge--who needs terrorists when there are Republicans"
