advice for a beginer please.

[dannyb]

i recently got myself a dslr and straight away i went out to get snapping at 2 local car shows. my question is 'how can i stop a subject blending into the sky?'

take this photo for example, the white roof and the sky are blending into each other, i took a few shots in the same position and this is the best i could get.

 

[HoppyUK]

The sky is bright, effectively white. The car roof is white. It's gonna happen.

Shoot against a darker background.

 

[vaizki]

As Hoppy said, a tough one.. how to stop 2 things that are the same color from blending into each other..

Well I have only one newbie idea.

If you have a lot of light, you could try a circular polarizer on the lens. You'll loose a stop of light (meaning you need 1 stop higher ISO, 1 stop larger aperture or double the exposure time) but the camera will take care of the math.

The circular polarizer can reduce reflections (in the windows for example and water) and make the sky bluer. It rotates and you need to experiment what position gives the effect(s) you want. The position is not absolute, but in relation to the sun, so if you change position and shooting direction, you may need to readjust. Of course the effect is visible in the viewfinder so it's not that hard.

Composition is the part of photography where you move your feet before you press the button.. and it's a lot more important to the final image than all the whizbang computing happening in the gadget. I suck at it. And with 20/20 hindsight I'll tell you that you shot from the wrong direction

 

[HoppyUK]

As Hoppy said, a tough one.. how to stop 2 things that are the same color from blending into each other..

Well I have only one newbie idea.

If you have a lot of light, you could try a circular polarizer on the lens. You'll loose a stop of light (meaning you need 1 stop higher ISO, 1 stop larger aperture or double the exposure time) but the camera will take care of the math.

The circular polarizer can reduce reflections (in the windows for example and water) and make the sky bluer. It rotates and you need to experiment what position gives the effect(s) you want. The position is not absolute, but in relation to the sun, so if you change position and shooting direction, you may need to readjust. Of course the effect is visible in the viewfinder so it's not that hard.

Composition is the part of photography where you move your feet before you press the button.. and it's a lot more important to the final image than all the whizbang computing happening in the gadget. I suck at it. And with 20/20 hindsight I'll tell you that you shot from the wrong direction

Good shout but a polariser won't help with that pic, as the car's still white.

If you get the angles right, a polariser can remove reflections, sometimes almost completely, and if the car was dark with the very bright area being a reflection, the polariser would help by revealing the darker colour of the car underneath.

But if the car's white...

 

[vaizki]

Hehe I know the car is white and can't be helped (or shouldn't even). And the reflections are cool (at least on the body if not the windows). I was hoping the polarized would turn the sky bluer and give the clouds some more definition.. But it's probably too overcast for that to happen.

Hey, you could use a 1200 Ws studio flash with a red gel to make the roof red too!

 

[barryhennessy]

You need to drop the exposure down until the roof isn't blending into the sky.
Lower the aperture/shutter speed (depending on your needs).

You'll be left with a darker car body/rest of the photo.
If this doesn't leave you with a nice effect, which it might depending on what you're going for, then you need to brighten the car in Photoshop.
otherwise you need to 'put' more light onto the car, either by using a (big) reflector (cheap) or lighting (not cheap, more complicated).

Another option is to avoid the problem entirely: change angle so there's a less bright piece of sky behind the car. Or shoot the car without the sky in the background. Or just move the car!

Hope this helps.
-Barry