High Contrast Turtle Problem

calmwater · Oct 27, 2019

I came across this turtle on a nature walk. He's a rather large Snapping Turtle and I didn't want to get bit or disturb him for fear he might crawl off. The problem is that he was facing the wrong way for the sunlight. I tried a first shot and not good. He was just a black spot. Tried to change exposure, which helped but lost the surroundings.
Here's what he looked like at first.

Then, a little closer.

Then, tried to adjust exposure, but blew out the surroundings

Still closer.

Yet, with the sun at my back,

And a side view

C n C wanted. Question. In that it is a high contrast image, what would some of you people do to try and make it better? This was about the best I could get it. Any ideas or suggestions? I.m kinda stuck as to what would make it better. Thanks

Photo Lady · Oct 27, 2019

calmwater said:
I came across this turtle on a nature walk. He's a rather large Snapping Turtle and I didn't want to get bit or disturb him for fear he might crawl off. The problem is that he was facing the wrong way for the sunlight. I tried a first shot and not good. He was just a black spot. Tried to change exposure, which helped but lost the surroundings.
Here's what he looked like at first.

View attachment 181541

C n C wanted. Question. In that it is a high contrast image, what would some of you people do to try and make it better? This was about the best I could get it. Any ideas or suggestions? I.m kinda stuck as to what would make it better. Thanks

I think you did a pretty good job for what the condition of light offered you.. looking forward to hearing what others suggest too.. i run into this on occasion..He sure is a big husky one..

tirediron · Oct 27, 2019

Did you think of using a speedlight to add some fill from the front?

K9Kirk · Oct 27, 2019

Wow, that's one mean looking dude! Too bad about the light. That's why I don't like taking pics around high noon because of the shadows it casts on the underside of animals. I always wait until after 4 pm when the light comes in at a 45 or less for better light coverage. The last two pics are my favorites.

Photo Lady · Oct 27, 2019

K9Kirk said:
Wow, that's one mean looking dude! Too bad about the light. That's why I don't like taking pics around high noon because of the shadows it casts on the underside of animals. I always wait until after 4 pm when the light comes in at a 45 or less for better light coverage. The last two pics are my favorites.

i like early mornings or cloudy days

Ysarex · Oct 27, 2019

calmwater said:
Question. In that it is a high contrast image, what would some of you people do to try and make it better?

Fill-flash as Tirediron suggested is the appropriate solution if you're shooting camera JPEGs. Otherwise your camera is quite capable of handling that light contrast and rendering a photo with the background you see in photo two with the turtle you see in photo three. To do that you need a properly exposed raw (CR2) file and the skill and software to process it.

Joe

AlanKlein · Oct 27, 2019

Maybe if you offered him a carrot, he would turn around for you.

Overread · Oct 28, 2019

If your subject is heavily shadowed then you've a few options

1) Increase the light falling on the shaded area of the subject. You can do this with flash or even use a reflector (a white surface) to bounce the light from the main light source (in this case the sun) onto the subject. In both cases the bigger the light source relative to the subject, the softer the light. So if you just use the pop-up on the camera it might not look "as"good (though fill light you can get away with smaller sources and not have it look "as bad" as when the flash light is the main light); otherwise a speedlite flash mounted on top with something modest like a lumiquest softbox can make a lot of difference to the light.
Similarly a reflector can be used, pretty cheap and the can be small to carry around too as they fold down, then you can just pop one open when you need it. For a subject like this a reflector would work well (though even then try to avoid spooking them when opening it up). If it were a more mobile animal then flash starts to become more suitable the more you lose control over subject and scene as the flash works faster as its on the camera there's no juggling of holding and supporting the reflector.

2) Wait. It's a living subject and might move. However at the same time with uncontrolled subjects, esp wild ones, you might not get the reaction you want. It might choose to remain static whilst it is aware you are near; or it might avoid you and move away etc..

3) HDR. As noted above you can do this from a single file (tone mapping) if you've got a RAW shot. You'd simply process the photo twice, once for the bright areas and once for the dark and then merge the two resulting outputs like you would if you'd taken two photos for HDR (one exposed for the brights and one for the darks). With a living subject a single photo is often better since they will move; though with a subject as static as this one you could easily get away with two shots provided you were stable and still when taking them.

RVT1K · Oct 28, 2019

This is one of the things that makes nature photography challenging, the animals care not of your desires and will simply do what they do.

Given the lighting conditions, your options were limited. Zooming in on the face was the best way to get it exposed well without having the rest of the shot blown out.

Braineack · Oct 28, 2019

use a mirrorless camera with instant HDR stacking.
shoot raw, spot meter for the shadows and then reduce EV by around -3, recover shadows in post.
pop-up flash
not worry about blown out backgrounds that are unimportant

johngpt · Oct 28, 2019

If you can't fill in light with flash or reflector, expose so as to not blow out the reflective highlights, then bring up the shadows with your editing software. These days even jpegs are of such good quality that you can bring up shadows quite a bit. Braineack's middle recommendation looks really good.

calmwater · Oct 28, 2019

Thanks for all the info. Ya know...I never thought of the flash, and the thing is, I had one with me. There is even one on the camera but I never thought of using it. Well, whack the back side of my head and call me dummy. LOL I'm not that experienced in the editing side but I'll get it. Thanks again.