Another Picture Control Question...

Ernie Misner wrote:

John Retsal wrote:

John Retsal wrote:

I've asked a couple questions here and got, for the most part, some good replies. I've also been reading many other threads and I think I've just about closed in on what I need to to.

I want to run this by you folks first though.

OK, so, I'm not a heavy post-processing guy. I've got a couple custom Picture Controls that I like and would likely be applying to 90+% of the raw images I shoot. My question is this...

As I understand it, using a neutral or better, flat, Picture Control set in the camera, would allow me to better see whether or not, at the time of taking the shot, I need to adjust exposure. If I were to use a different one, say Standard or Auto, I may see in the EVF an image that I might think I need to bump the exposure on whereas in reality it didn't need that but rather it was the Picture Control that was using too much contrast and making it look that way.

Does that make sense?

Wow. OK, so I'm quoting myself because the replies so far have missed what I've said. Note what I've highlighted from my original post.

My question is based on what I've been able to gather in my research but I want to make sure I've got it right. So, again, my question...

As I understand it, using a neutral or better, flat, Picture Control set in the camera, would allow me to better see whether or not, at the time of taking the shot, I need to adjust exposure. If I were to use a different one, say Standard or Auto, I may see in the EVF an image that I might think I need to bump the exposure on whereas in reality it didn't need that but rather it was the Picture Control that was using too much contrast and making it look that way.

Is this accurate?

It's inaccurate in a way. Are you judging exposure by looking at the image on the screen or EVF? That's quite problematic. You will never know if your highlights are blown out by simply looking at the image. On a bright day they look too dark, and on a dark day they tend to look too bright.

Enable the blinkies as well as 3 color histogram on image review. For some images you might want blown highlights if they are in an unimportant area of the composition, for the sake of your subject if it is in a darker area. The histogram will tell you if you have blown highlights, and the blinkies will tell you exactly where.

The answer is to always take a test shot, take a peek at the histogram (bottom, right corner for the highlights), adjust exposure if necessary, then shoot the keeper image. If using the raw file you can use a bit more exposure than what the histogram is telling you.

Yes, your Picture Mode has an effect on the histogram, but it's not as great as you would expect. Do a simple test and shoot a scene using different pic modes, (and sRGB vs Adobe), then take a look at the differences in histograms (bottom right corner again for the highlights).

For now anyway, I got tired of looking at flat, low contrast images on my camera, and settled on the Standard pic shooting mode. If it's an important image it's still a good idea to bracket exposure a bit, then you have options later.

I defined a custom Picture Mode that sets the brightest level to zero, which gives a live time indication of where JPG images will have blown highlights.  The areas are black, so it's not quite as visible as the orange color on Olympus cameras, but at least it's an indication before taking the picture.  I can also use that to set my exposure for bracketing, so at least one image has no blown highlights in a bracket sequence.