Asher Kelman
OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Here's an issue that divides the snap shooter from the experienced photographer! The latter, all dedicated planners, know what problems are and how to face them.
Taming the span of light is critical to wedding photographers and many other situations. The darkest blacks and the brightest whites need to be captured equally and represented without the picture looking artificial or posterized. Meanwhile the mid tones, giving the full life of an object, needs to be utterly preserved.
Here we just deal with image capture, since if the information isn't there, everything that follows is already compromised! For now, we'll forget that neither monitors nor printers can show all this information, but at least we need the information to artfully alot to what can be seen and printed so that it all looks real! So this discussion is not just for swans but for ALL such dark to bright situations. For the swan pictures see the original thread here.
Still Holly's swan presents an archetypical challenge.
We don't always solve every difficulty. However, we can do better, by studio lights or even cheating after the fact!
Megapixel count is not relevant:. You need just DR!
Camera with highest DR you can afford: First one can have a camera with a better spread of dark tones to the brightest whites that can be spanned without losing either.
Avoid "High Noon": OK, you have the camera, now shoot later in the day or (if you are more like Nicolas than me, get up very early). This is avoid the brightest sun. That creates very dark shadows and terriblely uniformly over illuminated whites so there are no subtle shades!
In this case looking at the histogram, you may well find that it's impossible.
Polarizing filter: cuts glare and enhances the white tonalities, but this may not be sufficient for your swan.
Gradient neutral density filter or split filter:, use the grey part to pull down the bright sky and the clear part allows the foregorund and middle ground to be properly exposed too. This is of no use when taling pictures of swans on dark water or of a dark smart groom with a bride in gorgeous white!
Use shade of filtered light from trees: Here one can use a the gentler light and add a reflector to add back light. Well you migh scout for an overhanging branch over the edge of the water and wait...or throw crumbs! Is that allowed?
Overhead screen: to cut down the bright light to a gentle flattering diffuse light.
Fill in Flash: to fill in the shadows.
Cheat:
!. Bracket enough pictures with the bird perfectly exposed.
2. Take pictures of the water without the swan, obtaining ripples from a deftly tossed small stone!
3. In CS2, cut out the bird and its reflection, paste it into the water inside the ripples.
and then blend the perimeter.
and "Bob's your uncle!".
MF camera with Digital Back!
The next alternative is a great thing to try as a present to yourself once you have excelled with your current camera:
Rent a MF digital camera for the day or a weekend. I'd have a whole lot of projects set up in advance to give you your money's worth. You'll get another 1-3 srop of dynamic range. Also with a Sinar back, you can use the Brumbaer tools(free, I believe), to grab an extra 2 stops even by going even behind the RAW data to get nothing of the information lost at all!
Wide dynamic range Set-Up for Practice:
White lace, embroided blouse, white and silver fabric used for gowns, cushions and heavy drapes and place them into an assembly of dark scarves and a jacket with a branch on top.
This setup will allow you to practice spanning from bright to dark. Now take a shot and look at the histogram. There should be no part of the curve going into each end of the borders or else the scene is over or under-exposed!
Good luck!
Asher
Taming the span of light is critical to wedding photographers and many other situations. The darkest blacks and the brightest whites need to be captured equally and represented without the picture looking artificial or posterized. Meanwhile the mid tones, giving the full life of an object, needs to be utterly preserved.
Here we just deal with image capture, since if the information isn't there, everything that follows is already compromised! For now, we'll forget that neither monitors nor printers can show all this information, but at least we need the information to artfully alot to what can be seen and printed so that it all looks real! So this discussion is not just for swans but for ALL such dark to bright situations. For the swan pictures see the original thread here.
Still Holly's swan presents an archetypical challenge.
Holly said:However, there are clearly places on his feathers where the highlights have been lost. He's an affable creature who lives on the farmpond of an apparently equally affable farmer so I'll be able to go back once there's a bit of a thaw and re-try this. Do you have any advice how on to avoid this light-on-white issue?
We don't always solve every difficulty. However, we can do better, by studio lights or even cheating after the fact!
Megapixel count is not relevant:. You need just DR!
Camera with highest DR you can afford: First one can have a camera with a better spread of dark tones to the brightest whites that can be spanned without losing either.
Avoid "High Noon": OK, you have the camera, now shoot later in the day or (if you are more like Nicolas than me, get up very early). This is avoid the brightest sun. That creates very dark shadows and terriblely uniformly over illuminated whites so there are no subtle shades!
In this case looking at the histogram, you may well find that it's impossible.
Polarizing filter: cuts glare and enhances the white tonalities, but this may not be sufficient for your swan.
Gradient neutral density filter or split filter:, use the grey part to pull down the bright sky and the clear part allows the foregorund and middle ground to be properly exposed too. This is of no use when taling pictures of swans on dark water or of a dark smart groom with a bride in gorgeous white!
Use shade of filtered light from trees: Here one can use a the gentler light and add a reflector to add back light. Well you migh scout for an overhanging branch over the edge of the water and wait...or throw crumbs! Is that allowed?
Overhead screen: to cut down the bright light to a gentle flattering diffuse light.
Fill in Flash: to fill in the shadows.
Cheat:
!. Bracket enough pictures with the bird perfectly exposed.
2. Take pictures of the water without the swan, obtaining ripples from a deftly tossed small stone!
3. In CS2, cut out the bird and its reflection, paste it into the water inside the ripples.
and then blend the perimeter.
and "Bob's your uncle!".
MF camera with Digital Back!
The next alternative is a great thing to try as a present to yourself once you have excelled with your current camera:
Rent a MF digital camera for the day or a weekend. I'd have a whole lot of projects set up in advance to give you your money's worth. You'll get another 1-3 srop of dynamic range. Also with a Sinar back, you can use the Brumbaer tools(free, I believe), to grab an extra 2 stops even by going even behind the RAW data to get nothing of the information lost at all!
Wide dynamic range Set-Up for Practice:
White lace, embroided blouse, white and silver fabric used for gowns, cushions and heavy drapes and place them into an assembly of dark scarves and a jacket with a branch on top.
This setup will allow you to practice spanning from bright to dark. Now take a shot and look at the histogram. There should be no part of the curve going into each end of the borders or else the scene is over or under-exposed!
Good luck!
Asher
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