Evaluate My Photo

[MrSquigle]

Interested to know something about these pics, both very similar.

First one has more in the foreground and less sky. The grass is a vivid green and the sky is white and washed out.

This second pic is the opposite, more sky and less grass in foreground. Yet the grass is very dull and the skyline actually shows that there is a mountain there and a storm brewing.

Both these were taken on exact same settings, so why does the grass and skyline show up so different, other pics I have taken with more or less sky do the same. Times I have wanted less sky but wanted it to be the rich blue that is there, but comes out washed out and whitish.

How do I take it with the rich vivid green grass and the skyline showing what is actually there.

Why is it so....

[Serendipitist]

Interested to know something about these pics, both very similar.

First one has more in the foreground and less sky. The grass is a vivid green and the sky is white and washed out.

This second pic is the opposite, more sky and less grass in foreground. Yet the grass is very dull and the skyline actually shows that there is a mountain there and a storm brewing.

Both these were taken on exact same settings, so why does the grass and skyline show up so different, other pics I have taken with more or less sky do the same. Times I have wanted less sky but wanted it to be the rich blue that is there, but comes out washed out and whitish.

How do I take it with the rich vivid green grass and the skyline showing what is actually there.

Why is it so....

Maybe try a polariser which would definitely deepen the blue of clear skies.

[NordicMan]

Interested to know something about these pics, both very similar.

.........

How do I take it with the rich vivid green grass and the skyline showing what is actually there.

Why is it so....

The reason is that there is a huge difference in the brightness of the sky and the ground. The camera, regardless of digital or film, can only record a small portion of this range. You choose what range you want to record, using f-stop, ISO and shutter speed. This can of course be done automatically by the camera (ok, ignoring certain manual cameras). Whatever is brighter than the max brightness in your selected range will turn out completely white. Whatever is darker will turn out completely black. If you look at shadow parts in a variety of photos, you will see that some parts of the shadow areas often are completely black. But in reality, they were not black, there were some details there.

So, the problem here is that the sky is very bright compared to the grass. Based on the above explanation, this means that if you select an exposre for the green grass, the sky becomes totally white and have no details. If you expose for the clouds, the grass gets very dark.

What can you do?

1. Use a polarising filter on your camera, as suggested by Serendipidist. This darkens the sky, thus reducing the contrast, allowing you to expose for both sky and ground.

2. Use a Neutral Density filter. This is a transparent grey filter that darkens half your photo (the top half, where the sky is), again reducing difference in brightness between sky and ground.

3. Take two photos, one darker (capturing the cky) and one brighter (capturing the ground). Merge the two photos together using for example photoshop

4. Use a HDR tool (high dynamic range) such as Photomatix. Take 3 exposures, one dark, one medium and one bright. Run them through Photomatix. This is actually very easy to do.

5. Expose for the middle, so there are some details in the sky and the ground is not overly dark. Use Photoshop or similar tool to select the sky and darken it. Select the ground and brighten it. Adjust colour saturation. (this is the easiest way but will result in the lowest picture quality)

cheers

nm

Edited January 1, 2008 by NordicMan

[NordicMan]

Interested to know something about these pics, both very similar.

....

Both these were taken on exact same settings, so why does the grass and skyline show up so different, other pics I have taken with more or less sky do the same.

I bet that they were taken on some kind of automatic exposure. In simple terms, your camera evaluates the scene and attempts to expose it for an overall medium level of darkness (ok, it's more complicated than this).

If you point the camera upward and include more sky, there will be more bright items in the picture. Your camera will darken the overall photo to achieve the average medium greyness.

If you point the camera down, incuding more grass, there are more dark items in the picture and your camera brightens the overall photo.

What to do?

(Assuming you use digital camera)

Simple way:

For landscape photography, you have plenty of time to fiddle with the camera controls. Compose the photo as you like. Check the picture on the LCD screen, preferrably looking at the histogram also. If you want it brighter or darker, use the exposure adjustments (+/-) and take a new photo.

Depending on what kind of camera you have and what technique you prefer, there are lots of ways to adjust the exposure. Hope the above provides some clues.

cheers

nm

[astral]

Some cameras allow you to "hold" the exposure by half pressing the shutter button.

Centre the most important part of the photo and half press the button,

then re-frame the photo in the view finder before pressing the second half to take the photo.

Check the manual to see if you have this facility.

PS You may find you can "hold" the focus in the same way.

[canuckamuck]

Auto levels in Photoshop is sometimes a good way to simulate a polarizer. When I deal with haze I generally check the shot in auto levels first to see if it will cut the haze. Sometimes it will cause a radical jump in saturation and quite often it is unusable, but I use auto levels as a way to preview an image, seeing if the software sees it different. If you don't like what auto levels shows you, undo and move on.

I used autolevels on your darker exposure, and then fudged around with the sky a bit. Came up with a good compromise.

[Kan Win]

I also do the same in ACDsee, "Auto Level" and if it looks good then I keep it.

With my Songkran photos I have to use this as they are all with haze as I shoot out of a plastic protective cover for the camera. Will post a new topic on that one.

I never touch the "Original" photo, only a copy of it.

Good tips, thank you all.

Kan Win

[MrSquigle]

Yes some interesting tips to try next time and see if it helps, my camera does not have the screw on appendage for filters, so will have to give the other options a try.

Canuck has got what I wanted to try to get, if it be blue or stormy sky, I would like it to be included into the pic obviously and I now understand the average concept from the camera.

Thanks all.