"Understanding Exposure" by Peterson and taking pics with my Kit Lens

Hello all

I just took some pictures using my kit lens and I tried applying Peterson's principles by metering with "brother blue sky", recomposing and refocusing to my desired composition, and then taking the pic. I found that exposing to brother blue sky gave consistently darker pics than if I had just pointed the K10 forward and letting it meter. The first pic is with me metering and the second pic is letting the camera decide. I chose an aperture of f8 because I found the kit lens to take sharper pics when stopped down.

[Mechan1k]

Well ... it depends really with sky at the time ... your top photo hasa lot of light cloud .. and the camera would have metered on the bright cloud causing the rest of the image to go dark.

I have found though when it comes to daylight ... I seem to get more consistency when metering off grass ... it just seems to work out better.

[SpecialK]

Originally Posted by weaponx525

Hello all

I just took some pictures using my kit lens and I tried applying Peterson's principles by metering with "brother blue sky", recomposing and refocusing to my desired composition, and then taking the pic. I found that exposing to brother blue sky gave consistently darker pics than if I had just pointed the K10 forward and letting it meter. The first pic is with me metering and the second pic is letting the camera decide. I chose an aperture of f8 because I found the kit lens to take sharper pics when stopped down.

That is not "blue sky" :-) The kind you want to meter off is clear blue sky - facing away from the sun.

[raider]

I also have been studying about exposures metering and stuff. Based on what i know so far, the only time u would meter from the sky is if there aren't that many clouds and the sky is totally blue, as blue is a good middle tone.

If you dont meter from the sky, you can meter from the green grass, which is another good middle tone. If there aren't any green grass, then find some houses with red bricks. If there are none, then find some gray stones or something. Last resort is to place a gray card near the scene and meter from it.

I know it is not easy to do all these but these is what the books said!

[serendipity]

Try metering off your hand, it's always there And it works!


Mick

[ll_coffee_lP]

Yep...grass or hand does the trick.

c[_]

[snappy]

nobody use gray card anymore? I still have mine in the bag next to the sekonic.

[arbutusq]

THe hand is far cheaper than the grey card.....what can I say, I'm poor.

[SpecialK]

Try metering off your hand, it's always there And it works!


Mick

But overexpose 1 stop.

[Gooshin]

your digital camera comes with a very nifty feature called a histogram

a basic understanding of exposure, and what the histogram is telling you, will very quickly teach you what to do next (assuming the initial exposure is off)

likewise, modern raw converters allow you to bring light into darker areas,

so the next step is to understand the limits of your ISO settings, your camera, and your raw converter. (ie, if its just too dark, you'll just end up bringing up noise)

its not as difficult as it sounds, and no need to obey any rule of thumbs, everything is right there in front of you.

[dave sz]

Originally Posted by arbutusq

THe hand is far cheaper than the grey card.....what can I say, I'm poor.

you can walk into your local paint store and take some of their gray cards. Or use the white body cap that came with your camera...

[mickeyobe]

WeaponX525

I do have a grey card but don't bother with it any more.
One can use an asphalt road (not new - the one in your photo looks ideal)) or a green lawn (also as in your photo) or the blue sky 90 degrees from the sun.
There is always the "sunny 16" rule as used in pre-metering days. But why bother when your camera's metering system is so very good and versatile?

Mickey

[monochrome]

To my mind the singular advance of a digital SLR is the ability to change ISO in camera. In film days, composition of light was a 2-dimensional adjustment. Now it is 3-dimensional.

Shooting manual, using a meter and gray card and adjusting all three settings to achieve a desired effect is worth some time spent learning.

[puderse]

All you folks should read those small gray books by a guy named ADAMS!!!

[Gabe]

What you're describing is normal behavior for the camera. The thing is that the sky is way too bright compared to the foreground and no camera can capture such a big difference in tones, so you either:

1. Expose for the sky: which as in your 1st photo gives you a nice sky but turns the rest dark, or
2. Expose for the grass: which as your 2nd photo shows, gives you a nicely rendered foreground (grass, tree, street) but blows out the sky (it goes too white)

In the case above, you can either do a HDR image or just try again when there is better light. Maybe around sunrise or sundown the overall scene will be more evenly lit, giving you a nicer picture.

I suggest you read up on exposure metering to understand what the camera is doing, as there are different modes in the camera that read the scene differently.

There's a fairly easy to understand explanation on shutterstation.com here.