Mid Day At The Beach

[smoke665]

Unfortunately ended up there at the worst possible time of the day. so decided to experiment. Sunny day with mixed cloud cover.

First shots at ISO 200 across bay (sun at back) with 300mm came out flat as expected. Histogram reflected very narrow DR. Moved to another location so the sun was closer to 90 degrees from side, and added polarizing filter. It helped but not significantly.

Out of curiosity I bumped the ISO up to 800 which brought the shutter up to 600, and the DR seemed to improve.

Anyone care to explain why?

 

[goooner]

Could you post the photos?

 

[smoke665]

Unfortunately in the boonies with limited access today. Will try later.

Just curious as to an explanation of the effect of high ISO and fast shutter in noon sun.

 

[dasmith232]

Unfortunately ended up there at the worst possible time of the day. so decided to experiment. Sunny day with mixed cloud cover.

First shots at ISO 200 across bay (sun at back) with 300mm came out flat as expected. Histogram reflected very narrow DR. Moved to another location so the sun was closer to 90 degrees from side, and added polarizing filter. It helped but not significantly.

Out of curiosity I bumped the ISO up to 800 which brought the shutter up to 600, and the DR seemed to improve.

Anyone care to explain why?

I'm curious about this. Mid-day sun is definitely high-contrast and harsh. Haze will make things appear more "flat" and can narrow the histogram. But I'm curious about the "very" narrow histogram and what (else?) caused this. I can create wide (or narrow) histograms under many different lighting conditions, based on the framing and exposure. Except for an even-colored wall; that's going to be narrow histogram regardless!

First, I'll think through the exposure settings (which I think will NOT be the factor in the end). Going through this backwards, you mentioned that ISO 800 gave a shutter speed of 1/600. You were using a polarizer with side-lighting, which is about a 2-stop decrease in exposure. This is mid-day, so the Sunny-16 rule probably applies (and the scene brightness is EV15). All this adds up to an aperture of about f/9. The gyrations to arrive at that number are simply working through the exposure triangle...

All this means... Hmm, well, nothing. If these numbers are close to correct, then there's nothing interesting about the exposure that I can think of. You weren't close to any of the limits of your equipment.

But polarizers can do wonders with reducing glare, and especially with humidity and haze conditions. Because you said "bay", I'm assuming water and (therefore) humidity. Plus, you said side-lighting, which is where polarizers are most effective.

Without a polarizer, you'll get haze in those conditions. With it, you'll see more contrast and color in the conditions which I assume from the description.

I think you're seeing the effects of the polarizer. I also think that the ISO and shutter speeds you mentioned have little or nothing to do with this, unless you pushing into a slightly over-exposed image.

What are/were the metering and exposure modes?