im sure most everyone here this is a oversimple question bracketing

[lambertpix]

Your OP example is only in digital and is taking several shots with different exposures (sometimes done automatically) so that they can be combined later in a HDR composite.

Funny... when I read the OP, it said nothing at all about HDR. I think the existence of an AEB mode in SLR's (film cameras) and DSLR's and the advent of HDR were originally two separate phenomena that have subsequently become linked in popular usage.

 

[bribrius]

Your OP example is only in digital and is taking several shots with different exposures (sometimes done automatically) so that they can be combined later in a HDR composite.

Funny... when I read the OP, it said nothing at all about HDR. I think the existence of an AEB mode in SLR's (film cameras) and DSLR's and the advent of HDR were originally two separate phenomena that have subsequently become linked in popular usage.

want to know something real funny? I didn't know what the term meant when I saw it on this site three weeks ago. I had to go look up what hdr was. Then camera window shopping I kept seeing hdr references so I read a subsequent article to have any clue at all about it.

 

[cynicaster]

If I’m shooting in fairly even/forgiving lighting (say, a summer evening outdoors with no backlighting, etc.) and I’m using a semi-auto mode (such as Av) then I usually just trust the camera to get the exposure right without even chimping. If I do chimp, it’s just to check for things like closed eyes, etc. The number of times the camera gets the exposure wrong in such situations is almost negligible.

If the lighting situation is more challenging (or “dicey” as somebody already said) then I’ll shoot, check the LCD preview/histogram, then manually adjust and re-shoot if I’m not happy with what I see.

Maybe I should think about using bracketing… I don’t know. It’s easy to do and I’m well aware of what it does, but I just haven’t felt a need to use it. Maybe if I were photographing something that only had a window of opportunity of a few seconds and I wanted to make absolutely sure I got a good exposure, I’d set up bracketing to allow me to fire off 3 shots really quickly, using burst mode if necessary. I don’t find I do a lot of shooting where that type of thing comes into play, though, and manual adjustments just seem to make more sense if time permits.

 

[abovenormphotos]

Hi. Bracketing allows you to take multiple photos of the same scene using different exposures of your choosing.

This is especially useful in cases where the dynamic range of the scene is very high - when the difference in the brightest part and the difference in the darkest part of the scene is too large for the camera sensor to capture and reproduce in one shot.

How you can use this to your benefit?
You can use photoshop or other similar photo editing software to merge the two photos together.

Eg given a landscape scene with bright sunlight, if you expose for the bright parts(-2EV) then the sun or other very bright areas won't end up being overexposed but the darker parts, usually the foreground will become very dark and detail is lost.

Thereafter when you expose for the darker parts (+2EV) the darker regions will be captured correctly but the sun and other bright areas will be severely overblown and details are lost yet again.

Not to worry, you now have 2 usable shots each with a good exposure for certain elements in the scene. Then you combine the two in photoshop to produce an image with all the details and little or no parts overblown or over dark.

 

[Gavjenks]

Actually, if I'm not mistaken, bracketing was a "thing" back in the film days -- certainly before the popularity of HDR, though HDR is far and away the most popular use of bracketing now.

Bracketing your film photos often IS HDR if you use more than one of the negatives per print, which people did/do. Sometimes you bracket just cause you don't know which one you will use. Sometimes you actually combine them.

HDR is not a digital invention. Since the dawn of photography basically people have taken more than one negative and swapped them out (in addition to just dodging and burning which is tonemapping) to get sufficient dynamic range.

And I don't recall the film cameras (least what i had) having a bracketing mode?

The bracket mode simply is a shortcut for changing the exposure for you so youc an be lazy. There's nothing stopping you from changing the exposure yourself by -3, 0 +3 stop or whatever.

You can bracket with pieces of film in a toiler paper tube and a shutter made out of duct tape, if you want.

Almost every setting in a digital camera is pure convenience. With the exception of perhaps ISO versus roll film where you'd normally have to wait till the roll is up (though this is not a problem with sheet film), and image stabilization (and I believe that can still work with film cameras, but there aren't a ton of models that overlap)

 

[bratkinson]

Bracketing as in the old definition, is simply several shots (advancing the film between shots) while selecting different exposures (either aperture or shutter speed in the case of film) to increase one's chances that at least one exposure would turn out well (after processing).

</geezer hat on> Back in the 'good old days', before there was auto anything, or aperture priority, or shutter priority, or 'scene' modes like sports/landscape/portrait, EVERYTHING had to be manually set. Once a film was chosen and loaded into the camera, its ASA speed (ISO speed, these days) was essentially unchangeable until another roll of film was loaded, which may (by choice) have a different ASA speed.

So that left only the aperture and shutter speed to be manually set by the photographer. Most photographers (myself included) carried a light meter to manually meter the situation and make my settings as appropriate. For the 'really important' shots that =had= to have a good result, photographers would bracket (change the shutter speed and/or aperture) in steps either up, down, or both ways (typically a fraction of a stop) at a time to ensure a good, or best exposure. Back then as today, light meters can get fooled and can come up with a less than great result. In my own experience, I was at Disneyland in Anaheim CA in 1977 and was in front of the Magic Kingdom castle at dusk. Using a trash receptacle as a 'tripod', I took perhaps 5-6 shots of varying shutter speeds, in seconds, as I was using f16 to ensure a good depth of field. 5 of the 6 slides were trashed and I kept the best. In Washington DC one summer night, I took some shots of the US Capital and its reflection in the reflecting pool, again using a trash receptacle as a tripod as my shots were in the 10s of seconds long. Again, I took maybe 6-10 shots, and actually kept 2 or 3 of them, as the amount of darkness-hidden details 'came to light' with the longer exposures.

THAT was what bracketing was in the 'good old days'. </geezer mode off>

These days, many cameras can automatically bracket an exposure, at either a whole, 1/2 or 1/3 stop slower and faster, depending on menu settings. But that only produces 3 total exposures, and typically (maybe always?) various only the shutter speed, not aperture or ISO speed. Check your camera user manual for a complete description. But, as in my film examples, 1 stop either way may not be enough. However, for many HDR situations, it is probably sufficient.

However...

Automatic bracketing is not a substitute for understanding the basic exposure triangle. Based on the OPs original post, it seems to me that he is shooting in manual mode without understanding that his shutter speed is too slow (no tripod and shaking). Bracketing should be used for 'insurance' or HDR, not 'spray and pray' photography.