[Newtophotos]

Often when taking pictures of interesting architecture or distant landscapes I'm caught between two choices; 1) taking the picture so that the blue sky and clouds are visible but the building/landscape is dark and possibly shadow filled. 2) taking the picture so that the architecture or landscape is bright and far less shadowed but the sky comes out completely white. What sort of techniques exist to brighten the object while still keeping some color and clouds in the sky?

I've tried to take only photos where the sun is illuminating the object but this isn't always possible if the interesting face/side is away from the sun.

[k5astro]

Your not going to like this answer but... HDR. I've attended architecture photography workshops and they use HDR all the time. Inside shots where the windows are blown out and outside skies... So you will probably have to put your camera on a tripod and take +/- 3 stops extra exposures. Put them together in post. But they don't do it with software that creates 32-bit images. They mask the areas that have different exposure settings and use layer blending in PS or something similar. My new K5II does this in camera but only to JPEG output. You will need to do this on RAW images.

[k5astro]

PS: Landscapes are often done with graded ND filters. But I think HDR would be cheaper and easier.

[TER-OR]

I've had some luck with metering correctly on the sky and then recovering the shadows in Lightroom. Everything but the sky will be shadows in PP...

[pero]

The graduated filter in Lightroom simulates a physical graduated ND filter and can work wonders. Expose for the buildings or landscape and then bring the exposure of the sky down with the filter. If you don't have Lightroom there may be other software with the same function.

[Na Horuk]

- tripod+multiple exposures. Not practical with moving subjects, like trees blowing in wind, because branches wont align in all exposures. But it is a suitable solution. Often called HDR, exposure stacking,.. can take quite a bit of hard drive space.
- graduated ND filter (square is better than screw-on, because squares can be placed at any point). Great solution, but can get expensive and takes a little getting used to.
- software trickery (exposing to the right, but making sure the highlights arent clipping, then making the shadows brighter using a "fill light" type function). Not too expensive, all-digital. Has limitations and can reduce IQ.
- get camera with bigger dynamic range. Actually the Pentax K-5 (II, IIs) seems to be really good at this, especially at ISO 80. All the modern Pentax DSLRs are good at this, but you have to shoot raw and also use good raw developing software. Jpegs dont have enough information to recover a lot of things.

You can also try using the "highlight correction" (I think thats what its called, not sure, but its in the INFO menu), which can help you out. It is basically software trickery, done in-camera. But it prevents you for "choosing" the lowest ISO - but the camera will still use it, it just pretends its higher.

[johnyates]

get camera with bigger dynamic range. Actually the Pentax K-5 (II, IIs) seems to be really good at this, especially at ISO 80. All the modern Pentax DSLRs are good at this, but you have to shoot raw and also use good raw developing software.

Works for me. Careful exposure (check your histogram) plus post processing. There's not too many scenes that the K5 cannot handle.

[adwb]

If you have one use a spot meter to get the brightest point exposure then stop down two stops. Compose on your building using the stopped down exposure. You mostly will be able in LR or whatever be able to get the clouds and the shadow details . If that fails then HDR or multiple exposures stacked is the way.

[Inexorable]

I have struggled a lot with this issue and one of the solutions that worked for me was Single Exposure HDR to leverage the relatively higher dynamic range of the K-30 / K-5 / K-3 cameras and their RAW files

Here is an example of the result.

I posted an explanation of the technique on my blog at

Single Click High Dynamic Range (HDR) Photography – Pro Grade and Free!

Please be warned that I am a hobby photographer who embarked on a journey to learn photography a while ago on this forum holding hands of the good folks on this forum.

[wildman]

How to handle bright skies over architecture/landscapes?

Except in the most extreme cases a properly exposed RAW file and skillfull PP should do it.
Assuming, of course, you are using a K5 or later.

[bdery]

Have you run tests with a polarizer? In many situations it will work finely for what you intend.

[k5astro]

Have you run tests with a polarizer? In many situations it will work finely for what you intend.

Good point! One should always use a polarizer on a sunny day anyway... brings out the colour and suppresses glare including that from the atmosphere an cloud.

[johnyates]

use a spot meter to get the brightest point exposure then stop down two stops

This is not correct and will lead to severe underexposure.

Read the brightest area in which you wish to retain detail and then open up two stops. This is the technique used to expose slide film as well.

[rrstuff]

What I usually do is, I take a picture and check the histogram. I expose until there is no highlights left. With the current generation cameras, it usually means up to one stop. And as others said previously, polarizer helps a great deal. If you don't have a critical noise application and expose at ISO200, it won't be a problem.

If you have a critical application and can't tolerate the noise, the other thing you can do, that's a bit easier than blending into an HDR is doing multiple exposure. Set up a tripod and put the intervalometer (does K-5 have one?) on 4 exposures and underexpose each image so it retains highlight information. The noise (as defined by StDev) of an image scales with a square root of number of exposures, so doing 4 exposures will decrease the noise by 1-stop, just as much as you underexposed. Make sure to use intervalometer and a 2-second mirror lock up, so you get sharp shots.

[adwb]

This is not correct and will lead to severe underexposure.

Read the brightest area in which you wish to retain detail and then open up two stops. This is the technique used to expose slide film as well.

Sorry that's w hat I meant typo on my part