Help! Way too bright/white!

[MonicaRuth]

Wanted to see if anyone could figure out a way to make this look more natural. I love the composition but the natural light was not in my favor

This is the photo ^



This is just so you can see what her skin actually is...

 

[ronlane]

You could try to burn it with Lightroom or Photoshop but the best way would be to reshoot and either use a diffusion panel or wait until a different time of day (early or late).

 

[texkam]

Your whites are blown. The digital information is lost. You can't really make up these pixels short of hand coloring.

the natural light was not in my favor

Don't blame it on the light. You need to learn how to properly expose images. I bet you had your camera set to some auto setting. Forget the "settings" and learn how exposure works. When in doubt, bracket your exposures.

 

[KmH]

I love the composition but the natural light was not in my favor
View attachment 57108
This is the photo ^


View attachment 57109
This is just so you can see what her skin actually is...

The light was in your favor, in all honesty the issue is you don't yet know how to use your camera to your advantage.

The issue is using the wrong light metering mode for the lighting situation. Your D3100 has 3 light metering modes you can choose from.

Spot metering would have been appropriate. You use the spot (about 2% of the entire scene, and concurrent with the selected focus point) to meter the highlights on her facial mask - her forehead, cheeks, nose, and chin.

I suspect your camera was in Matrix metering mode, which averages the light in the entire scene, for both shots (the second is somewhat under exposed) and her black hair and the dark foliage in the background of the first shot biased the exposure.

Study pages 79-82 of the D3100 users manual (on the software disc that came with the camera as a PDF file) or download the users manual PDF file here - https://support.nikonusa.com/app/an...2LzEvdGltZS8xMzgwOTIxNTI1L3NpZC9XYWlLTlpCbA==

As mentioned the bright ares of her face have zero detail because each of the 3 RGB color channels is max'd out at 255 (pure white).
On those parts of her face that have one or 2 of the channels at less than 255, some detail could be recovered using ACR if you have a Raw file of the image.
If all you have is a JPEG the image cannot be saved.
But even if you have a Raw fie, the best fix is to re-shoot and get the exposure correct in the camera.

 

[MonicaRuth]

The issue is using the wrong light metering mode for the lighting situation. Your D3100 has 3 light metering modes you can choose from.

Spot metering would have been appropriate. You use the spot (about 2% of the entire scene, and concurrent with the selected focus point) to meter the highlights on her facial mask - her forehead, cheeks, nose, and chin.

I suspect your camera was in Matrix metering mode, which averages the light in the entire scene, for both shots (the second is somewhat under exposed) and her black hair and the dark foliage in the background of the first shot biased the exposure.

Study pages 79-82 of the D3100 users manual (on the software disc that came with the camera as a PDF file) or download the users manual PDF file here - https://support.nikonusa.com/app/an...2LzEvdGltZS8xMzgwOTIxNTI1L3NpZC9XYWlLTlpCbA==

As mentioned the bright ares of her face have zero detail because each of the 3 RGB color channels is max'd out at 255 (pure white).
On those parts of her face that have one or 2 of the channels at less than 255, some detail could be recovered using ACR if you have a Raw file of the image.
If all you have is a JPEG the image cannot be saved.
But even if you have a Raw fie, the best fix is to re-shoot and get the exposure correct in the camera.

THANK YOU!!!! I haven't yet started photography classes at my college so I've just been messing around and researching as much as possible. I haven't had much time to go through the manual but I will definitely look at that stuff and try to re-shoot

 

[KmH]

The information in the D3100 users manual is the information at this point that forms the foundation of your photography knowledge.

In addition to the light metering modes, you also need to be familiar with the auto focus modes, focus area modes, white balance setting options, and most of the other features, functions and capabilities your D3100 has available for helping you make high quality images.

 

[texkam]

All the auto settings are great and can be useful tools, but I would learn how to shoot in manual mode first. Understanding the roles that speed, aperture and iso play and what the tradeoffs are in changing them is about the most important thing you can learn.