Exposure question in low-light environment

[awitness]

Hello,


I am seeking help on a exposure question. I took stills at the last reception gallery event last weekend, unfortunately though I had a very slow lens available to me that evening and so some of the images came out slightly dark.

See photos below;




My question is, what am I ought to do in order to expose image properly, meaning expose for the subject and not the background? Now if I had a f1.4 lens, would that fix the problem?

If I increase the exposure it brings up the highlights and not the shadows.


Also, would a tripod be a necessary item to have for this kind of shoot?

Any advice would be highly appreciated.

Thank you,

Sam

 

[Robin_Usagani]

You need an external flash bounced to the ceiling. If you expose it to the subject (by increasing ISO and aperture), then the artwork will be very blown white. If you slower the shutter, then you hand will be shaky and picture will be blurry.

 

[MLeeK]

A tripod would be fine, but it will result in any people in your image being blurry from their movement.
What ISO were you shooting at? Looks to me like you could have raised it-a lot.

 

[awitness]

MLeek, Yes I did have to raise it by quite a bit. It was set to 800.

External flash. Hmm...I guess that would do it.

I appreciate your feedback

 

[Robin_Usagani]

Raising your exposure wont fix the problem unless you dont care about the artwork.

 

[Derrel]

The spot lighting on the art work is being read by the light meter, and the metering is yielding a very lovely, nice exposure for the artworks!!!

Unfortunately for you, the gallery's ambient lighting is causing the people to be quite a bit darker. Now, the people are in MUCH darker lighting than the artwork is...so...the metering needs to be adjusted OR the lighting on the people could be "elevated" by bringing in some flash.

On shot #2, the metering is just too "under". I would say these need to be exposed about five full f/stops MORE, to get the people brighter. Of course, then, the bright lights on the artwork is going to be right at the border of burning out...

 

[Kolia]

MLeek, Yes I did have to raise it by quite a bit. It was set to 800.

External flash. Hmm...I guess that would do it.

I appreciate your feedback

Experiment going as high as the camera can. You can deal with the noise in post.