Subject in shade with bright background

[Fiddlepics]

I cant figure out what setting to use here, for when the subject is in the shade and there is a bright sunny background or a lake. The face comes out so dark- I have tried all the metering settings, including spot and i havent had much luck. Below are two samples, the first is a dark face, and the second is spot meter with a blown out background.

 

[yardcoyote]

Well, the standard thing to do with a backlit subject is to try adding several different levels of "a little +EV" and try to make a compromise. You could also try a more active solution like moving around the subject to find a darker background, moving the subject to a well lit spot or to a spot with a dark background. You could wait until a different time of day when the light is better. Early in the morning and late in the afternoon are much more camera friendly than a bright midday. I've been known to "wait for a cloud" if there are any. Sometimes you can save a shot if you shoot at the right moment.

 

[LynniePad]

Have you tried HDR or ADL?

These are techniques for allowing for difficult lighting conditions. Without special techniques, your #2 is about as good as you'll get.

Here's where I've used ADL...





And then HDR on another day...

 

[darklamp]

First you can try fill flash ( Canon call that sync flash if memory serves me ). Essentially you're using the flash to light the dark subject that's close enough for flash and leaving the normal exposure to capture the background. Your manual will explain how to do it.

Second you can try post processing the dark areas. This is often referred to as fill light in editors. LightZone ( which is free ) has a tool for exactly that purpose call "Relight". Ideally you'd start from RAW but I've found this works surprisingly well from JPEG as well.

 

[RonFrank]

There are a few ways to handle this.

1) Post Processing. It is fairly easy to adjust the exposure of the foreground in post.

2) Fill flash. My favorite. Rather than adjust anything, add flash to the foreground. Meter off the background and set the flash based on that. So if the background is f8 at 1/250 set the flash to f8 and that should balance the exposure. Remember your flash shutter caps at 1/250 or maybe 1/180.

3) Compose so the background is not in sunlight. Often the easiest solution is to put the entire exposure in shade, or sun. Now the light is even.

Try all three as you should develop an ability to deal with multiple situations. Your subject may be unwilling to move, or the shade and sunlight is impossible to avoid.

Have fun!

 

[Fiddlepics]

I've never tried HDR- I always assumed it was more complicated than standard PS elements editing...What is adl?

 

[Fiddlepics]

Thank you so much everyone for your helpful responses! Is spot metering the correct way to go here? Also, I do have an external flash that I use indoors. I used it last week at a shoot in the shade with the built in diffuser set at 1/32 and it worked well, but for some reason today when I used the flash it had a very obvious flash look. Here are the shoots from last week and then the one from today-











Granted the first picture has more even lighting, but shouldnt the second picture not have any shadows on the faces at all if it has a flash?

 

[FrankieJ]

Thank you so much everyone for your helpful responses! Is spot metering the correct way to go here? Also, I do have an external flash that I use indoors. I used it last week at a shoot in the shade with the built in diffuser set at 1/32 and it worked well, but for some reason today when I used the flash it had a very obvious flash look. Here are the shoots from last week and then the one from today-





Granted the first picture has more even lighting, but shouldnt the second picture not have any shadows on the faces at all if it has a flash?

Think it through, your battery powered flash unit versus - the Sun, the power source for everything in our solar system.
I think your going to need a bigger flash unit to compete with that =).
That being said, fill-in flash will help lower contrast outdoors but cannot cancel out the effect of the sun, UNLESS you provide a LOT more flash power OR wait till the light levels drop later in the day (good advice anyway) to the point where your existing equipment can come closer to taming your lighting ratio issue.

 

[Aberaeron]

I cant figure out what setting to use here, for when the subject is in the shade and there is a bright sunny background or a lake. The face comes out so dark- I have tried all the metering settings, including spot and i havent had much luck. Below are two samples, the first is a dark face, and the second is spot meter with a blown out background.

In taking these images I would have had no hesitation in using fill flash if close enough, or dynamic range optimisation in-camera. The reason I prefer this to HDR, whether in-camera or through bracketed exposures post-processed, is that the subject is alive and probably would move during multiple exposures.

Some brands handle DRO better than others and many do not have the feature fitted. I am not aware of any that shoot RAW and process with DRO. [it is rather contradictory to do so].

Otherwise of course, you could raise the shadows of either a RAW or jpeg file in post editing. You would probably get better results from a RAW file in that case. Remember that bright clipped highlights are not recoverable but good results can often be had from raising shadows, so it is almost certain that you would get better results from the top image than from the bottom one.

 

[tedolf]

I cant figure out what setting to use here, for when the subject is in the shade and there is a bright sunny background or a lake. The face comes out so dark- I have tried all the metering settings, including spot and i havent had much luck. Below are two samples, the first is a dark face, and the second is spot meter with a blown out background.

a touch of shadow recovery and turning down the highlights in a post processing program might surprise you. BTW, they are both very nicely composed portraits (except for chopping of the foot in the second one!)

tedolph

 

[Fiddlepics]

Thank you! Its always nice to get positive feedback I picked these pictures more to point out the issue with shadows than the composition, but thank you!

 

[tedolf]

Thank you! Its always nice to get positive feedback I picked these pictures more to point out the issue with shadows than the composition, but thank you!

As I said, the second one is probably totally recoverable. No currently available sensor has enough dynamic range to get detail of both the highlights and shadows of that shot, but I am sure someone has already told you that. With subjects that do not move, you could do an HDR, but that is another kettle of fish altogether, and I wouldn't recommend it for a portrait.

Tedolph

 

[Limburger]

If your camera is capable of HSS (high speed sync) you can get a capable flash so you can shoot faster than the actual sync speed.

This is typically used in situations with a dark underexposed subject lit from behind.

Imho worth checking out.

--
Cheers Mike

 

[Mark B.]

I've never tried HDR- I always assumed it was more complicated than standard PS elements editing...What is adl?

Not sure what adl is either, but HDR would be most effective in this case if 1) the camera is on a tripod and 2) the boy remained motionless during the multiple exposures.

A better option would be to use an external flash and give balance to the bright background.

 

[Fiddlepics]

I'll check it out on my external flash manual- thanks!

 

[LynniePad]

Seems you've just received a short course in photography!

There are many ways of approaching this, and fill flash is probably the best.

The earlier suggestions of HDR and ADL are also worth trying; Active D-Lighting (ADL) is Nikon‘s name for an additional step in the internal image processing that mainly lightens dark areas of the picture. As mentioned HDR is probably best suited to landscape.

 

[Tom Axford]

I cant figure out what setting to use here, for when the subject is in the shade and there is a bright sunny background or a lake. The face comes out so dark- I have tried all the metering settings, including spot and i havent had much luck. Below are two samples, the first is a dark face, and the second is spot meter with a blown out background.

You've had a lot of useful suggestions. These sunshine and shade situations are difficult to handle, even with the best cameras. Unfortunately, the output device used for viewing the image (e.g. computer screen) cannot handle to range of brightness present in the original scene.

However, many modern cameras are capable of capturing more of this dynamic range (as it is called) than is viewable. So post-processing can improve the situation by brightening up the shadow areas. The image above is fairly extreme, but running it through Lightroom to raise the shadows and reduce the highlights, gives the result below. Many other image editors (including free ones like Faststone) will do much the same.





Shooting in raw will give you slightly better results when raising deep shadows (the raw image file saves a greater dynamic range than does the jpeg).

 

[Teila Day]

If your camera is capable of HSS (high speed sync) you can get a capable flash so you can shoot faster than the actual sync speed.

Correct! Good point. High Speed Sync works wonders when you're shooting somewhat up close.

This is typically used in situations with a dark underexposed subject lit from behind.

Imho worth checking out.

 

[Teila Day]

I cant figure out what setting to use here, for when the subject is in the shade and there is a bright sunny background or a lake. The face comes out so dark- I have tried all the metering settings, including spot and i havent had much luck. Below are two samples, the first is a dark face, and the second is spot meter with a blown out background.

For the shot below you have 3 (THREE) main options.

1. Use flash to fill in the shadows; depending how strong your flash is, it might not give the result you want if you shoot portraits towards the sun or bright backgrounds with long lenses (e.g. 300mm) on sunny days.

2. Use a ND (neutral density) filter to lower your shutter speed by x amount of stops (the filters come in different strengths; a 3-stop filter would work nice here. I recommend B+W filters) and use your flash to light your subject while the ND filter keeps the background from being "blown out" or over exposed.

3. Use a TRIPOD and take two exposures:

(a) shoot the background (I'd even use flash to add detail to the shadows in the trees in many cases).

(b) without moving the tripod, have your subject sit/stand where you want them and take a well exposed shot of your subject with or w/out using the flash.

(c) in Photoshop, combine the two photographs using layers and "paint-in" whatever exposure you want for any given portion of the final photograph, by using the two original shots as your source.

A happy boy out in the sunshine, suspenders, t-shirt, out and about amongst the rails and rocks.

It's just a nice wholesome scene!

Best in photography to everyone

--
Teila K. Day

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