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white sky in landscape shots :(

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sangu

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i took some landscape shots..

the problem i faced was white sky in the location...yes the sky was really white..not a blue sky
because of this , the landscape shots were looking pale :(

what to do ? any suggestions to improve fotos at this situation

how to cope up with white sky?

--
sangu
a 'zero' in phtography
 
Sometimes you just need to wait for a better day with better light. It's pretty hard to make a landscape shot under a cloudy sky look as contrasty as one shot with a blue sky (if that's what you want).

Sometimes I use products like Topaz Adjust to bring out more contrast and interest in the sky (assuming it didn't get blown out).
 
sangu said:
how to cope up with white sky?
Click to expand...
One of the top bits of advice for landscape photographers is to wait for the best light, typically near sunrise or sunset, and to hope for good sky and cloud conditions

You can shoot without much, if any, sky in the picture. You can replace the sky in photoshop.

--
http://fruminousbandersnatch.blogspot.com/
 
Sangu, you're not the only one who noticed the infamous canon white sky problem. If you had the pleasure of using either an Olympus, Fuji, and other camera with good exposure control, you noticed the canon has a tendency of over-exposed the sky to the point of WHITE!

Both my 6mp Fuji F20 and 5mp Sony W5 render the blue sky better than all my canon dslr. By the way, I had Canon 30d, Canon 400d, Canon 450d, and now a Canon 500d. The problem still persist. The solution is actually rather simple
  • Problem: Canon default Contrast is too high and render sky WHITE
  • Solution: LOWER YOUR CONTRAST (-4) in Picture Styles
Here is my own example:













Or you can use the canon's own Clear Picture Styles



"Standard" Picture Styles


sangu said:
i took some landscape shots..

the problem i faced was white sky in the location...yes the sky was really white..not a blue sky
because of this , the landscape shots were looking pale :(

what to do ? any suggestions to improve fotos at this situation

how to cope up with white sky?

--
sangu
a 'zero' in phtography
Click to expand...
 
If the sky really appears white to you, then your only hope is
  • A circular polarizer (unlikely to work if there isn't any blue to your eye, but it will help the contrast)
  • Wait for the right light
  • Paint the sky blue in Photoshop or GIMP
There is also the technique of gelling your flash to be tungsten-like (CTO) and adjusting the color balance - which will make everthing not flashed pretty blue.

If the sky is bluish already, then you do have some hope of bring the blue out in post-processing as described above.

PP methods beyond those described above:
  • HDR / Tonemapping - though this is usually more for scenes with too much contrast, local contrast enhancement may still be helpful for overly-flat scenes.
  • Turn on "Highlight Tone Priority" in the camera or underexpose by 2/3rds of a stop when photographing blue-green conditions (except for 7D / 60D / 550D)
 
Shooting in RAW and using the adjustment brush in lightroom3 is your best friend in this situation. Just slightly underexpose the shot, so the sky isn't clipped to white, and use the adjustment brush to lower the exposure to the sky/increase the exposure of the ground...

Mike
 
The problem is not just the white sky. You can usually replace the sky with something more interesting if you are really ambitious. The other problem is the flat boring lighting, which is hard to overcome.
--
Jim
http://www.pbase.com/jcassatt
 
If you're in certain areas of Asia for instance you'll be waiting quite a while for the the sky to turn blue. Filters won't help much either.

The most effective method i've found is the standard Nikon program NX2. It allows you to clone a selected area and fill any other defined area.

The problem with bucket coloring is that it's homogeneous. It will look better, but it doesn't look very realistic.
 
Don't worry. I'm using 500D (T1i) with 18-55mm IS. Sometimes I got nice color, sometimes just white. Not really sure why, still a beginner. Here are the blue skies of an island in java sea, Indonesia. Sorry for the funny English.

edit: all straight from camera JPG. Just resize using DPP.









--
Budi
 
jpmalohesr said:
Some good reading for you ..

http://www.nathangriffin.com/technical/how_to_graduated_nd.htm .
--
jp
Click to expand...
....you do know that ND grads are used while capturing the photo, they prevent the sky blowing in the first place. If you are implying that the dynamic range in the scene will be too great even with an ND grad, I would remind you that they come in different strengths and gradations, solving that problem.

I hope the OP reads up on them, one of the essentials in a landscape photographer's bag :)
 
Try going to the picture style area and lower the contrast to -4. Also you can apply the highlight tone priority. This could help with dynamic range.
--

Darkness is the monster and your shutter is your sword, aperture your shield and iso your armor. Strike fast with your sword and defend well with your shield and hope your armor holds up.
 
...Shoot RAW so you don't get flat, boring images due to the lack of any appreciable contrast ;)
Rakumi said:
Try going to the picture style area and lower the contrast to -4. Also you can apply the highlight tone priority. This could help with dynamic range.
--

Darkness is the monster and your shutter is your sword, aperture your shield and iso your armor. Strike fast with your sword and defend well with your shield and hope your armor holds up.
Click to expand...
 
Kellen said:
...Shoot RAW so you don't get flat, boring images due to the lack of any appreciable contrast ;)
Rakumi said:
Try going to the picture style area and lower the contrast to -4. Also you can apply the highlight tone priority. This could help with dynamic range.
--

Darkness is the monster and your shutter is your sword, aperture your shield and iso your armor. Strike fast with your sword and defend well with your shield and hope your armor holds up.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
lol, jpegs are awesome thought.
--

Darkness is the monster and your shutter is your sword, aperture your shield and iso your armor. Strike fast with your sword and defend well with your shield and hope your armor holds up.
 
1) Try RAW since it contains more informations that can be recovered than JPEG.

2) Avoid shooting with the sun front of you. If possible, then make it behind you and you can get better blue for sky.





Just my exp. Just got my 550D as an upgrade from G11. So, still long way to learn.
--
Totally not-even-amateur
Trying to capture everything that get into my eyes
 
... an ND Grad can't put color in the sky if there is none to start with.... I agree it is a useful tool
--
jp
 
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