Lighting issues with Snow scenes

A

astral16v

Suspended / Banned
Messages
196
Name
Noel
Edit My Images
Yes
Here's one I hope you can help with.

I am having varying results with Snowy shots. I have tried using the camera ( Sony A100) on Auto and Aperture priority and using Spot focus then Auto exposure comp etc. and under exposing the shots by 1 stop but I am struggling to get consistent results. I am using Minolta glass which I know works well normally.

Any ideas where I am going wrong ?

I am having to use Dodge and burn to get a good balance between the Contrasts in the photos. Is it a white balance issue ?

Any help would be appreciated.

Noel
 
I was always told you need to over expose when shooting snow not under, the metering will be out with snow as the camera is set to 18% grey by default
 
wack61 said:
I was always told you need to over expose when shooting snow not under, the metering will be out with snow as the camera is set to 18% grey by default
Click to expand...

Won't over exposing loose detail and end up with a burnt out picture ?

I have been under exposing purely so I can retain as much detail as possible then applying corrections to the Raw file in post production.
 
nope, you need to over expose what your camera is telling you. If you underexpose then you're going to be trying to pull detail back from at least 2 stops down so your IQ is going to suffer. Don't forget, the camera is metering the white as 18% grey. If you took the image as that, your white snow wouldn't be white, hence you need to over expose on the reading. Check your histogram and get the end of the graph just touching the right edge. Good luck
 
Meter from the brightest tone that you want to retain detail and then open up (overexpose) by 2 stops!

This may help!
 
What I did was to meter against something that was kind of neutral in manual, and then as long as the light doesnt change then hopefully you've got your exposure level right. I used a light green bush and then a bit of tweaking, seemed to work fine.
 
The meter will assume that any subject matter is a medium grey. That is how it is calibrated. Therefore with snow you will get particularly underexposed results.

In my experience with film, which is pretty difficult to get right, add about 1.5or 2 stops for correct exposure.
 
Thanks for the replies. I will have a play later this week when not in work to see if I can improve.
 
Overexposing is always better than underexposing as it is easier to resurrect a blown out photo (particularly RAW) than an underexposed one - and trust me I've tried both. Give me an overexposed photo over an underexposed anyday.

If you are finding your pics are blown out try cranking up your F stop and then changing the other settings to compensate. I also use my camera only on manual mode so I don't know whether that changes anything or not, might give you a bit more flexibility?

Might also be worth trying fully auto mode, sometimes that works!
 
One phrase pretty much sums it up... "more of the same"
And you'll probably remember that much more easily than do I over expose? do I under expose? and so on.

It doesn't matter if you're trying to shoot a black cat in a coal hole, or a snow leopard in a blizzard. The camera meter will try it's hardest to give you a mid grey. So if it's snowy white and you want it to come out like that... more of the same :)

hope it helps
 
Bill Roberts said:
One phrase pretty much sums it up... "more of the same"
And you'll probably remember that much more easily than do I over expose? do I under expose? and so on.

It doesn't matter if you're trying to shoot a black cat in a coal hole, or a snow leopard in a blizzard. The camera meter will try it's hardest to give you a mid grey. So if it's snowy white and you want it to come out like that... more of the same :)

hope it helps
Click to expand...

I was just reading about this today as I flicked through my `numpty newbie' camera manual. But this makes the best sense to me - much more memorable :clap::clap::thumbs:. Thanks very much - any more like that?
 
Note that over expose doesn't mean actually over expose the image, it just means over expose according to your cameras meter reading.

I find that a typical snow scene will often require 2 or more stops of over exposure, the only way I can shoot in snow is to use the histogram and try to get it as close as possible to the right. Took me quite a few duff shots to figure that out. Normally when I chimp I try to look predominantly at the image, but in snow I just can't do it, everything comes out dark unless I use the histogram.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top