OK, Im stupid..what am I doing wrong??

jon104496 · Aug 31, 2002

HELP! (please see examples)

Hi, in a quite Sunny WHITBY (UK) and took this picture...White balance was set to 5500, ISO 80....This (which is the worse example) and a few others came out this black! I presume it was because of the sun?? I wasnt using the 'hood' would that have helped?? (note, the picture looks like everything was in the shade....but it didnt seem that way when I took it!)

There was also another (same location) with my wife as subject stood at some railings...I focused on her head, shot and she came out nearly black!!

I normally shoot with everything on 'P' and Auto White Balance....this is the first time I have preselected Whitebalance...could that be it...

I did take some portrait shots also (using fill-in) and these mainly came out OK....and the other pics I normally take are fine too!..but Im sure that in the past Ive shot long'ish distance in the sun...and they havent come out this dark!! What am I doing wrong! - Note: If I edit on Photoshop, I still get a half decent result by over lightening the mids....I look forward to any help! Thanks

brianf · Aug 31, 2002

Jon,

Looks like you metered on the sky which made the ground very dark, if you meter on the darker areas they will look good but then the sky may be blown out, i've found its a bit of a compromise taking these shots difficult to get perfect exposure on both sky and ground.

If you are the Jon who E Mailed me you have mail.

Brian.

LCD · Aug 31, 2002

This might help. Set the camera to Aperture mode. Set the aperture you want for the shot. Meter on the sky and make a note of the shutter speed. Meter on the dark area and note the shutter speed. Now average the two shutter speeds to get the shutter speed for the shot at that aperture. AWB usually works fine outside.

LCD

A E Hansen · Aug 31, 2002

Looks like a good time for a graduated neutral density filter.

--
-- A E Hansen

dgrogers · Aug 31, 2002

Matrix or ESP metering is the ideal metering system to use in this situation, and would have prevented this from happening. Reducing contrast would also help.

--
dgrogers

http://www.pbase.com/drog

John Ellis62065 · Aug 31, 2002

I think a graduated density filter would do the best without making either the sky too bright or the ground too dark. Otherwise, one or the other is not going to be optimal. I have recently bought a blue and neutral one for these kinds of shots and they really are nice. Otherwise the remarks before are right on. If you don't want to get into filters (fun to fool around with), use Matrix metering like dgrogers suggested; it usually works well.

--
John Ellis

Lory Hawley · Aug 31, 2002

Hi there,

I'm considering ND graduated filters for a trip to the Southwest in Oct. What brand did you get, and did you get the holder with them?
And how about posting the results?
Regards,
--
Lory

steve wilkes · Aug 31, 2002

the other alternative is to take 2 pics - one metered for the sky (like you did) one metered for the lowlights - buildings etc- and stitch the 2 together in photoshop etc. If you use a tripod - even better, as the match will be spot on.
--
Steve
http://www.swilkes.com
E-20/Minolta Dynax 7/ETRSI/5X4 & kodak Instamatic

LCD · Aug 31, 2002

I do not think so. Indeed, I would guess that's what he had it set to. It is not that smart a function.

I was faced with the same weather on the UK West coast today and the same problem and, left to itself, it got it wrong. It does seem to take into account where you focused and exposes accordingly - it weights the outcome. Point is its range is not enough for it to take all of the scene so it makes a choice based on where you focus. At least if you expose for the highlights the shadows are somewhat recoverable.

LCD

LCD · Aug 31, 2002

It would be easier to average the result as I suggested. Yes?

LCD

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LCD

Phil Rose · Aug 31, 2002

Jon,

You've spent quite a bit of cash for a camera with an excellent manual mode. I think that learning to use M-mode might help you a lot in difficult lighting situations--like the one you described.

Set camera to "M" shooting mode, and turn on the LCD monitor (preview). What appears on the monitor will be a reasonably good approximation of the actual exposure effects you will get in your shot. Adjust the shutter speed to the minimum you're comfortable with (or higher), say at least 1/100--unless using a tripod. Then, while observing the LCD screen, rotate the aperture dial until you see a pleasing balance of exposure between the sky and foregound. If you run out of aperture adjustment, then try changing the shutter speed, as needed.

Compared to the other shooting modes, M-mode gives you instantaneous visual feedback on the effects of your exposure settings without "wasting" the time that might be needed for trial-and-error inspection of several shots. It also eliminates the exposure errors that can occur when inadvertant camera movement changes the spot-metering "target".

Phil

Lawrence Keeney · Aug 31, 2002

JONDW,

I spent a couple of minutes in Photoshop with your picture. I'm sure others could do much better than I did.

Lawrence

--
Lawrence

Jerry Monroe · Aug 31, 2002

All of the comments here are good but they miss one of the best cures for exposure problems. Use the manual/visual approach that one of the guys suggested, then set your camera on bracket (the third choice down (BKT) on the main menu) and use it to take a full range of possible exposures.

Personally, I would meter on the sky and then take three shots with the bracket and then I would meter on the ground and take three more shots with the bracket. Somewhere among these six shots you should get the best exposure that you can get.

matt chase · Aug 31, 2002

Hey Jon,

Everyone here has given good advice on how to better shot this type of scene next time around, so I will just give you some advice on how to fix up shots like this after they have already been shot.

Better, huh?

It's a pretty easy technique if you have Photoshop. I think Paint Shop Pro also supports layers, but I'm not sure if it supports adjustment layers. So, what is an adjustment layer?

See that layer direcly above the image, that says "Levels" on it? That is the adjustment layer. In Photoshop you have the option of doing most of your brightness, contrast, color correction, and similar editing on adjustment layers. I added that using the icon that has a yellow circle around it, and made the brightness corrections to the image to make the lower half of the image look as good as I could. This caused the sky to be completely blown away.

Here is where doing the adjustments on it's own layer comes into play. Notice the adjustment layer has 2 small boxes, one that looks like a histogram and another where the bottom is white and the top is black? That 2nd box is the key, it is called a layer mask. By using the eraser tool, I erased the sky portion of the corrections that I made to the overall image, literally erasing the adjustment layer from just the sky. That way the exposure on the sky stays as it was in the original image, but the brightening I did still affects the bottom of the image.

And two other great reasons to do it this way: you can set your eraser tool to a percentage, so that if you still wanted to brighten the sky a little you could erase just a percentage of the effect. And since it is a layer "mask", you are not really deleting the information that is there, you are only hiding it. With the foreground color set to Black, you are hiding the information, but switch your foreground color to White, and you can "unhide" the information. Slightly confused? It is does take a bit of sideways thinking, but once you do it a few times you will get the hang of it.

--
Matt Chase
http://www.matthewchase.com

::::thud:::: zzZZZzzZZzzzzZzzzzzz

charles ward · Aug 31, 2002

Jon

the shot really wasnt that bad. It could easily have been sorted out in Photoshop or some other editing software.

You will learn that dark photographs can easily be corrected with little or no adverse effects using the 'levels' in Photoshop.
Best wishes
Charles

vince lorto · Aug 31, 2002

Brian was correct. Your camera metered the sky in ESP mode so that the sky would not be blown out.

Rule of thirds...

It looks like your attention should be focused on the landscape so bring more of the landscape (1/3 sky), change your metering to spot and meter the landscape. your landscape should look good but the small portion of sky will look washed out. Use a neutral density filter on the sky...

vince lorto · Aug 31, 2002

Obviously in manual, you can make any adjustments you please, but would the camera meter the scene incorrectly?
Just curious,

Vince

jon104496 · Sep 1, 2002

Many thanks for all those who have contribute to my 'knowledge' and 'learning curve'. I have now learnt that in the situations like these, I do need to perhaps use spot metering to avoid the camera metering the sky when using ESP.

I am also thankful for the Photoshop advice and now have a half decent picture from my original 'black one'.

I bought the camera to enable me to learn the 'manual' side but still rely on the automatic for quick shots. I do heavily rely on the LCD (after shot preview) to look at the pics and of course, when its a really bright day....you cant see the LCD properly anyway!!

I have started using the Aperture and shutter priority with some good results....so maybe soon I will be ready for 'm' mode...

The E-10 will be with me for some time....I hope to take better pictures......and thanks for all your help...

Cheers

Jon....

...and heres one of the wife on the same day...this one came out OK!

TomGallo (AKA RacerX) · Sep 1, 2002

I corrected this by selecting all of the sky area using the magic wand tool and inverting the selection so that only the darker area at the bottom was
selected.

The Auto Levels tool brought the white and black points to a good level, making the bottom area look pretty good.

I didn't bother to clean up the border between the two halves of the picture (artifacts from the selection process).

Here's the fixed version:

TomGallo (AKA RacerX) · Sep 1, 2002

Here's a crop of the image, using the rule of thirds. I think it's a stronger composition this way:

OK, Im stupid..what am I doing wrong??

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