Easy Exposure - Topic: Overexposed

ronald on Overexposed

Thu, 06 Feb 2014 04:15:54 -0800

You sound like my son Dale, he works a lot with Photoshop and tells me exact the same: most of the time he uses Lightroom instead. I really want to start working with it. Thanks for the advice on this!
Ronald

nikonguy on Overexposed

Wed, 05 Feb 2014 19:46:05 -0800

Ronald
Lightroom is a great addition that will make your already good pictures
even so much better! It's quite easy to master and I think once you purchase
it and play around with it for a while you'll learn to love it.
I have Lr and Ps and I find myself using Lr much more than Ps because it's such
a "user friendly" program.
Photoshop is an incredibly powerful tool that allows you to create unreal images
but its hell to master and I've spent hours and hours watching videos on youtube
and writing loads of notes to try to figure it out.
Dale.

ronald on Overexposed

Wed, 05 Feb 2014 08:33:14 -0800

Thanks Oksana, for your great advice. I've also returned a little bit to your lesson 13 about the sunny 16. I thought though that te pictures turned out a little dark that way. Maybe I'll have to play a little with the shutterspeed, keeping the aperture on 16 and ISO around 100. You know, every day is different for me, since my camera is a part of my work here. I make short docu-films about poverty, the needs of whole comunities around here and yesterday was such a day. I went out to a place nearby in order to film some of our projects there. I explaned to my coworkers that I did not want to leave before 3:PM, so we did. Made some really great shots, photo's as well as film, especially when the time came close to 6:00 PM, the world seems to turn into pure gold, I like to work around that time!

A reflector I still don't have, Adobe Lightroom is on my list to buy and thus I carry on doing the things I like: taking pictures

easyexposure on Overexposed

Tue, 04 Feb 2014 14:05:10 -0800

In the middle of the day sun is high in the sky, it is stronger and created stronger shadows, which is harder to manage. In the evening and early morning light is the best and more even. Most of photographer prefer these times of the day.

Also in the middle of the day contrast between highlights and shadows is higher, so you need to find the way to balance them out. First of all I would always shoot in Raw, because raw files are easier to manipulate in post production, since they contain more info then jpeg. You can recover your highlights and lighten the shadows more easier with Raw files. Lightroom is a great tool for doing it.

You can also use flash or reflector to fill the shadows while shooting during the middle of the day. You can also shoot HDR, when you take a few picture with the different exposure and then combine them in postproduction. Sometimes you can use shadows to your advantage, do create more dramatic look. It is just the matter how you position them. Try to turn your subject around and see what kind of shadows you get.

ronald on Overexposed

Tue, 04 Feb 2014 07:46:50 -0800

And by the way: thanks for reminding me of lesson 13 about the sunny 16 rule. I did watch it some time ago, but am watching it once more as we speak, great stuff as always!

ronald on Overexposed

Tue, 04 Feb 2014 06:35:23 -0800

nikonguy said
Believe me ronald - photography has never been easy for me...but it sure
is a great hobby and makes sure you get lots of exercise chasing down those
elusive, once in a lifetime shots lol!
Dale.
By the way - evaluative metering is in camera as is partial and spot metering. Evaluative
takes the whole scene into account and it usually works quite well.

Hi Dale, I tried different modes in light metering, but still prefer the spot metering, since I have more control over the amount of light I want to be measured. I did some tests, put the ISO on 100 in stead of automatic and pointed the camera to the brightest places and the results were much better this time. Still, the pictures seem to have less sharpness and the images are rather boring, but I guess that's just the way it is. Light gets much more interesting early in the morning or during "golden hour", which would be between 5-6 PM at the moment. This afternoon I'll be filming some of our projects in one of the poorest neighbourhoods around. I choose to start at about 3:30 PM and hope to catch some good light and deep shadows...

nikonguy on Overexposed

Mon, 03 Feb 2014 18:00:41 -0800

Believe me ronald - photography has never been easy for me...but it sure
is a great hobby and makes sure you get lots of exercise chasing down those
elusive, once in a lifetime shots lol!
Dale.
By the way - evaluative metering is in camera as is partial and spot metering. Evaluative
takes the whole scene into account and it usually works quite well.

ronald on Overexposed

Mon, 03 Feb 2014 17:22:29 -0800

nikonguy said
Are you using evaluative metering for your exposure? In bright light I would always
leave my iso @ 100. Sometimes people use bracketing to take several exposures
and see which one looks best. Taking pictures against bright light is tough and sometimes
I actually use spot metering and meter on the brighter areas to avoid blowing them out
if possible. With the last pic (on the horse) I would probably expose for the horse and
check the results.
Oksana's help is probably needed to sort this out - she is the Professional in this forum and
she will probably have the definitive answer to make your future shots in these conditions look
great. She also has a great tutorial video out on "the sunny 16" rule - if you haven't watched it
give it a look.

Good luck with it.
Dale.

Thanks for your support! The only metering I use is from within the camera itself and in these shots I used spot-metering. You're right about trying to direct the metering to the brightest spot, but it isn't always easy. Anyhow, this will be my first thought next time... Also a reason for pictures to get boring is the absolute lack of shadows, since we are mid-summer here in Brazil and the sun stands right above our heads I think that shadows make photo's much more interesting, because at the end, photography is all about catching ligh... Well, we just keep on trying Dale, after all, it's the challenge that makes photography so interestin. It must not get too easy

nikonguy on Overexposed

Mon, 03 Feb 2014 13:57:07 -0800

Are you using evaluative metering for your exposure? In bright light I would always
leave my iso @ 100. Sometimes people use bracketing to take several exposures
and see which one looks best. Taking pictures against bright light is tough and sometimes
I actually use spot metering and meter on the brighter areas to avoid blowing them out
if possible. With the last pic (on the horse) I would probably expose for the horse and
check the results.
Oksana's help is probably needed to sort this out - she is the Professional in this forum and
she will probably have the definitive answer to make your future shots in these conditions look
great. She also has a great tutorial video out on "the sunny 16" rule - if you haven't watched it
give it a look.

Good luck with it.
Dale.

ronald on Overexposed

Sun, 02 Feb 2014 16:55:29 -0800

Hi you guys! I've been on the road a lot today and made many pictures of which about 90% failed... I always thought that the biggest problem would be a lack of light, but my main struggle recently is the oposite: too much light. It seems that the best pictures are made early in the morning and late in the afternoon. In between pictures just get boring and shallow. Not always overexposed because I try to manage that with shutterspeed, Aperture and ISO, but still... What is your experience in that area? How do you cope with this? I'm really curious to learn from the pro Another question is about choosing between sRGB and Adobe RGB. What do you guys recommend? Thanks in advance! Here are some examples of today:

Picture 1:
f/16
1/125 sec.
ISO-250

Picture 2:
f/3.5
1/125 sec.
ISO-100

Picture 3:
f/9
1/125 sec.
ISO-500

Picture 4:
f/9
1/125 sec.
ISO-500

Picture 5:
f/5
1/160 sec.