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krillen
Jan 9, 2002, 3:46 PM
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I went to Mexico over the holidays and took a whole whack of shots, but I found a lot of the were underexposed or had a tonne of shadow. The problem is there was a lot of sun on the backs of the climbers and I was far enough away a flash wouldn't help.
My question is, how do I get the faces to come out without over exposing the rock or background? Please don't suggest mega-expensive solutions (I wich I had a scanner to show you the pics in question, but no such luck).
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ratstar
Jan 10, 2002, 4:06 PM
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Do you have a SLR camera? If you do learn about the settings on it and see what ap size and what speed.
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krillen
Jan 10, 2002, 4:27 PM
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I know about apature and Shutter speed, infact I tried a bunch of different combinations. I thought maybe the climbers face would come out more with a shallower or deeper depth of field, but to no avail. there was just SO much light coming off the rock it would overexposed had a taken a reading off the climbers shadowed face.
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saltspringer
Jan 10, 2002, 5:32 PM
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sometimes you can't justify the differences between highlight & shadow in a photo, period. You need to take a meter reading in the highlight area and then one in the shadow area to see how many stops difference there is between the two. Most print films have about a two-stop latitude (very forgiving) and most slide films maybe 1/2 stop...so, if you determine that there is too much diffference between the areas I'd recommend recomposing the shot to either show the entire route with the climber at a dramatic point or zoom in on the climber and not worry as much about the background...Another possibility is to use a graduated Neutral Density filter that will maintain balanced exposure between a bright sky & darker landscape,
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passthepitonspete
Jan 10, 2002, 6:48 PM
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Understand your machine and your light conditions. Read a book on photography. Read two books. Your library will have them to read for free.
Incidentally, the Hamilton Public Library downtown has a superb mountaineering and climbing section where I have spent many hours indeed! Nowadays cheap bastards like me can hang out at Chapters and read for free, but there are much better climbing books in the library.
Hint: At Chapters, at least look like you want to buy the book.
Take lots and lots of pictures and figure it out!
[Bracket!][Bracket!][Bracket!]
Figure out what you think the best shot will be, and shoot an f-stop or two on either side.
Do not be afraid to "overexpose", especially on snow, white rock, or during backlighting. You are not really overexposing - your light meter is being fooled by the whiteness.
Carry a card of "middle grey" and take your light reading off of that. I see guys on ski hills doing that all the time.
White rock will fool your light meter, you have to overexpose at least one f-stop on ANY white rock virtually every time, except perhaps under extreme low light conditions. If you are shooting sunny white rock, you will probably need to overexpose two f-stops from what your camera reads.
With backlighting, you might want to "overexpose" even more.
Learn the "photographers' rule" of light so that you can shoot good photos without even LOOKING at your light meter!
It is sometimes better to know what setting to use, rather than to read your light meter. This may appear counterintuitive at first, but consider this - your light meter will probably read it wrong anyway!
Believe it or not, I shoot most of my climbing photos with no reference to my light meter at all!
So learn the "photographers' rule."
Slides are cheaper than prints, and look way bitchin'er on the screen than little bitty prints in your hand. With slides, "you're there, dude."
Now, you may say my bracketing solution is "expensive" because you take three or four shots every time. Fair enough.
Scottish accent:
But at least yull git one gude shot instead of a whole rrrrrrroll o' crrrrap, lad!
Resume normal Hoser accent:
The problems you describe are all easily corrected if you know what you are doing.
If you do not understand everything we are saying, then please refer to paragraph one above!
Cheers,
Dr. Pee'd On
Who as he writes this is sitting in front of a wall of approximately ten thousand prints and slides.
Do note that said wall consists only of the prints and slides I deemed worthy to keep. I have certainly thrown away several thousand more!
By the way, my basement is available for big wall tutorials (just did one with Grant last month) and my living room for slides any time. Just like, bring a couple beers, eh?
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krillen
Jan 11, 2002, 2:07 PM
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thanks for the input guys, esp Saltsrpinger.
"Most print films have about a two-stop latitude (very forgiving) and most slide films maybe 1/2 stop...so, if you determine that there is too much diffference between the areas I'd recommend recomposing the shot to either show the entire route"
this is the type of advice I can really use, I was talking to a photographer friend of mine and he suggested climbing in that type of situation instead of shooting in those conditions. Like I said I was far enough away my flash wouldn't have done much good (however had I been closer it would be a good suggestion).
I DID learn a lot from my trip as far as photography goes. Now I just have to keep practicing until I get there.
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beyond_gravity
Jan 17, 2002, 3:51 AM
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I have the same problem when i'm shooting skateboaring pic's on the concrete outdoor park. I tryed using a polorizer, and that helped a little, but not too much.
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krillen
Jan 17, 2002, 4:53 PM
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One thing I read the other day was: cloudy days are great for shooting because everything is EVENLY lit, very little shadow.
I'm paraphrasing, but I could see that. using a flash or diff. apature settings to compensate for the light conditions is a whole lot easier than dealing with intense shadow.
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