Looking for some advice. CC requested

Virtuosos · Aug 10, 2011

I am still struggling with "seeing" a good exposure. I literally just recieved the "Understanding Exposure, 3rd Edition: How to Shoot Great
Photographs with Any Camera" so I haven't dived into it quite yet, and today was probablly the first day in 3 months that felt good enough to be outside...so I was much more interested in going out to the lake.

Anyways...

Like I said, exposure is the main thing I am going for in asking for C&C. Feel free to comment on other things as well, however.

1/6s, f\36
-0.7EV
Iso 100
No flash
Metering Mode: Spot
Focal Length 135.0mm

#2
F\8
Iso 100
Focal: 75.0mm
No Flash
1/100 sec
EV-0.7

I am not sure if I should try to find a way to light the walkway+lighthouse up or just turn it into a silhouette..

Anyways, lets have it!

*quick sidenote--the only editing done was straightening the shore out and cloning out some black spots in the sky from crap on the lens...I did use a circular polarizer. If someone wants to attempt to edit it, by all means go for it...just let me know what you do to it.

earthmanbuck · Aug 10, 2011

Well I'm pretty new to photography myself, but my understanding of a polarizing filter is that they make sunny outdoor scenes a little bit more vibrant and are good for killing glare off reflective surfaces. I don't really see why you'd need to use one for this type of scene...seems like you're just making it unnecessarily darker. If you wanted it lighter, you could also set your ISO higher than 100...

But upon reading your post again, I don't see anything about you saying the picture was too dark, so I guess that's just my opinion seeping inI don't really like how the lighthouse's details are visible but underexposed. I think you should either try to capture the features better or go full silhouette. My preference would be a silhouette, and without the people in it if possible.

Virtuosos · Aug 10, 2011

Yeah, the little filter was an accident. It was bright when I first got out there, and I got distracted with walking around and forgot I left it on.

The thing I am wondering though, is if I turned up the ISO then wouldn't I be losing some of the details in the sun light, making it more blown-out rather than the nice yellow? I suppose if I turned ISO up and sped up the shutter it would counter-balance it...I'll have to go back out there tomorrow.

As far as the people go, there isn't a way for me to get rid of em...This lake is highly busy with hundreds of people biking/walking/whatever around the lake + eating (which all the restraunts are next to the lighthouse anyways). I can clone them out, however. But you think blacking out the lighthouse+walkway would be better? I might try editing it to do so...

Trever1t · Aug 10, 2011

With the sun behind the lighthouse like that you can not get the sunset (bright) and the lighthouse (back-lit, dark) both exposed properly in the same frame unless you a) have big artificial light b) lots of little reflectors or c) try HDR.

Virtuosos · Aug 10, 2011

I was considering HDR...It looked like a good scene to try my first attempt. But, these people kept walking around and I am not entirely sure of how to DO HDR anyways lol.

Would just changing the shutter-speed to where it's completely black to completely washed-out, catching a few stops in-between, be good? And yes, I will look further into HDR...think I'll hold off fully researching it until I read this other book first.

KmH · Aug 11, 2011

Virtuosos said:
I am still struggling with "seeing" a good exposure. I literally just recieved the "Understanding Exposure, 3rd Edition: How to Shoot Great
Photographs with Any Camera" so I haven't dived into it quite yet, ....