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D-Rebelers - Let's See Your Portraits...

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Member said:
Here's my little bundle of joy as the 300D sees her:
JimmieD

Click to expand...
Great exposure! Looks like you used the Partial Meter, right? On which area of the photo did you take the reading from? I would imagine Evaluative Metering would have underexposed the girl since it would have taken into account the backlight, right?

I did some portraits outside the other day that all turned out VERY dark... my own mistakes though. 1) The girl was wearing an all-white shirt and the camera obviously underexposed because of this (I was concentrating more on taking the photo than making sure everything was set right), and 2) the background was very bright, so I should have used partial metering or Manual mode.

Thanks for any tips you can give for these type of portraits!
Travis
 
Only a couple shots have good WB. In many, the WB was quite off. Can be corrected in PS easily, but don't know how consisten this is.
Mongrel said:
First, let me say that I am not happy with this (yet). Not as
strong as I would like it. I've only had the camera a week and
haven't really gotten a chance to seriously 'play' with the
software side of things. Not to mention this is an extremely
downsize version (the site it's on limits uploads to 200k).

This is with the kit lens, portrait mode, no flash. Very
cloudy-overcast day (the lighting was poor, but no excuses!). This
is a fairly tight crop of the original which had two people in it.

Comments-criticism welcome....

http://www.usefilm.com/image/213404.html

Monrgel
Click to expand...
--
Lance
 
No you only mistake was not to use the image review option, it could have saved you taking home some under exposed shots. I have my review turned on with histogram info. I even have the review set to hold, and it can then be cacel with a press of the shutter release button.

The histogram on 300D is divided in 5 zones.

Zone III dark but with full shadow detail. CRITICAL SHADOW
Zone IV dark gray, Caucasian skin in shadow, .
Zone V middle gray, Kodak gray card. METERING ZONE
Zone VI light gray, Caucasian skin in sunlight

Zone VII highlight with full detail, very pale Caucasian skin in sun. CRITICAL HIGHLIGHT

A quick glance at the histogram will review how the shot was exposed. With a regular picture without predominant black or white color, everything should fall within the five zones.
Travis said:
I did some portraits outside the other day that all turned out VERY
dark... my own mistakes though. 1) The girl was wearing an
all-white shirt and the camera obviously underexposed because of
this (I was concentrating more on taking the photo than making sure
everything was set right), and 2) the background was very bright,
so I should have used partial metering or Manual mode.

Thanks for any tips you can give for these type of portraits!
Travis
Click to expand...
 
michael jurick said:
Would love to see more portraits from the group here. I'll start
with one of my own. This is actually the second shot right out of
the camera - shot in 400 ISO natural window light in Adobe RGB, no
flash, then converted to sRGB for web.



-MJ

PS: I love this camera.
Click to expand...
Had iso set to 200 here, not sure why i did that.



allready posted this one earlier, no post processing here.
http://www.pbase.com/image/21493373
 
Actually I did use the default metering. I suspect because the majority of the frame was in the darker foreground, the camera set the exposure for that. I have used the partial metering with great success. I was taking a picture of a big white crane like bird against some darker reeds. In that case the bird was being blown out do to the exposure based on the reeds. I just took locked on the bird and it came out perfect. I'm taking a while to learn this camera, but already I'm very pleased with what this total amatuer is producing.
JimmieD
Travis said:
Travis said:
Here's my little bundle of joy as the 300D sees her:
JimmieD

Click to expand...
Great exposure! Looks like you used the Partial Meter, right? On
which area of the photo did you take the reading from? I would
imagine Evaluative Metering would have underexposed the girl since
it would have taken into account the backlight, right?

I did some portraits outside the other day that all turned out VERY
dark... my own mistakes though. 1) The girl was wearing an
all-white shirt and the camera obviously underexposed because of
this (I was concentrating more on taking the photo than making sure
everything was set right), and 2) the background was very bright,
so I should have used partial metering or Manual mode.

Thanks for any tips you can give for these type of portraits!
Travis
Click to expand...
 
Member said:
Actually I did use the default metering.
Click to expand...
You mean you didn't use the Partial Meter? I was just looking at your EXIF data and it seems to indicate partial metering. Either way, very good exposure!

Travis
 
dchao said:
No you only mistake was not to use the image review option, it
could have saved you taking home some under exposed shots. I have
my review turned on with histogram info. I even have the review
set to hold, and it can then be cacel with a press of the shutter
release button.
Click to expand...
Actually, I did look at the histograms for the photos and the concentration seemed to be towards the center, so I thought everything was okay. I still have to learn how to read the histogram accurately. Maybe you can help me out. Here is one example from the other day and the histogram as shown in BreezeBrowser (these were RAW images so I was able to save many of them with Exposure Compensation). Note also that I was using the 420ex flash for fill, but it didn't help either (presumably because the white shirt is so bright).





Thanks,
Travis
 
I don't have a clue what the info is. It was my first day with the 300D and I was in P mode.
Rich


PaulyOly said:
michael jurick said:
Would love to see more portraits from the group here. I'll start
with one of my own. This is actually the second shot right out of
the camera - shot in 400 ISO natural window light in Adobe RGB, no
flash, then converted to sRGB for web.



-MJ

PS: I love this camera.
Click to expand...
Had iso set to 200 here, not sure why i did that.



allready posted this one earlier, no post processing here.
http://www.pbase.com/image/21493373
Click to expand...
 
It seems to be about lighting. In my unprofessional opinion the lighting really makes the shot, I learned something again. Thanks everyone.
Rich
Richard/Canada said:

PaulyOly said:
michael jurick said:
Would love to see more portraits from the group here. I'll start
with one of my own. This is actually the second shot right out of
the camera - shot in 400 ISO natural window light in Adobe RGB, no
flash, then converted to sRGB for web.



-MJ

PS: I love this camera.
Click to expand...
Had iso set to 200 here, not sure why i did that.



allready posted this one earlier, no post processing here.
http://www.pbase.com/image/21493373
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
I'm so sorry...you are right. I just looked at the original and it was partial metered. Please forgive my error.
JimmieD
Travis said:
Travis said:
Actually I did use the default metering.
Click to expand...
You mean you didn't use the Partial Meter? I was just looking at
your EXIF data and it seems to indicate partial metering. Either
way, very good exposure!

Travis
Click to expand...
 
I shot these at 400iso. I am starting to prefer Parameter 2 over Paremeter 1.
JimmieD



 
Member said:
I'm so sorry...you are right. I just looked at the original and it
was partial metered. Please forgive my error.
JimmieD
Click to expand...
Thanks for checking! The only reason I was curious is because I would have thought the exposure would have been a bit dark in Evaluative (since it also takes into account the backlight).

Thanks,
Travis
 
OK, you have the perfect histogram, and nothing is overexpose, all the details are there. Next step is to use photoshop.

So what we have to do now is to extend the dynamic range to Zone VIII, which is bright white with just a little detail (like the very brightly lit grass shown in the background).

I used the simple curves adjustment tool in PS. By dragging the curve up, I am extending the highlights and increasing contrast.



You can use the levels tool too, but curves tool is more powerful. For example if there is very little highlights in Zone VII, or if the highlights are not such big part of the scene. I can design a curve more like this one:



I hope you understand :-)
Travis said:
Actually, I did look at the histograms for the photos and the
concentration seemed to be towards the center, so I thought
everything was okay. I still have to learn how to read the
histogram accurately. Maybe you can help me out. Here is one
example from the other day and the histogram as shown in
BreezeBrowser (these were RAW images so I was able to save many of
them with Exposure Compensation). Note also that I was using the
420ex flash for fill, but it didn't help either (presumably because
the white shirt is so bright).
Click to expand...
 
dchao said:
OK, you have the perfect histogram, and nothing is overexpose, all
the details are there. Next step is to use photoshop.
Click to expand...
Thanks for that. However, I have already corrected many of them in Photoshop (not with curves because Elements doesn't have curves, does it) and by doing Exposure Compensation with the RAW images I appreciate the Photoshop advice, but what I was really getting at was "how could I have avoided it in the first place"? I would prefer to get the right exposure on the subject while shooting, rather than adjusting in Photoshop (which brings out the noise).

However, you seem to understand the histogram better than I do. When shooting a photo like the one I posted, how do I know if the subject is exposed properly by viewing the histogram? As you noticed, the histogram looked good and thus I thought the photos would be fine. It's hard to judge brightness on the LCD screen in review, so I had assumed they were fine until I got home.

Thanks!
Travis
 
Richard/Canada said:
It seems to be about lighting. In my unprofessional opinion the
lighting really makes the shot, I learned something again. Thanks
everyone.
Rich
Click to expand...
To true. Morning or evening light is best - midday is yuck.
 
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