Photography in Cloudy Weather

[DerekSalem]

I can't belive my ears when I read out loud that people are recommending to NOT get a Circular Polarizinf Filter. That's ludicrous. If you only ever have just one filter, it would be a CPL. Photoshop can't reproduce the effect. One should be in every photographers bag. Don't cheap out but the most expensive is not required either.... somewhere in the middle should do okay. Just make sure it is mutli-coated.

There is a difference between cloudy and overcast skies. Overcast does provide nicely diffused light for shooting, but looks ugly if it's part of the scence IMO. So you have to position yourself so that the subject is in the wonderful light, but the sky is missing. Cloudy on the other hand can provide some magnificent components to the image.

Just my 2¢.

Yes, a CPL is important for quite a few types of shots...but if she doesn't understand how the camera works it's pointless to throw a CPL her way. She needs to understand how to operate the thing before adding anything else. Just like it's dumb to give someone a 1D Mk4 and $2k L lens right off the bat...they'd learn much better on a less-ambitious model because they'd have to *work* for the right shot.

 

[KmH]

I want to go out and play around with my settings. I want to be able to take photos and come home and just upload them without adding any crap to them to pretty them up. Im taking just my 50mm lens with me. What settings do you recommend for cloudy weather on the beach? Just a basic idea of where to start and I can play with them from there. Thanks.

The settings needed would depend on how cloudy it is, the time of day, and which way the beach faces. There is also a huge difference between a partly cloudy day and an overcast day.

Cloudy/overcast days can make for nice soft light without the need to find open shade, but the light can also be very flat light particularly on overcast days. By flat I mean your subject, the forground (if any) and the background all have about the same brightness which eliminates a lot of the sense of depth that can make a subject 'pop' within a photograph. On partly cloudy days, your subject can be shaded with the foreground and background brightly lit cause dynamic range problems.

The way to over come the flat lighting and excessive dynamic range, is to use supplimental lighing. Strobed (flash) lighting is usually more portable than constant lighting and a big reason so many photographers are doing OCF (Off Camera Lighting) these days. www.strobist.com

Reflectors are pretty useless for reflecting sunlight when it's cloudy, but can be used to reflect a light source you've brought with you.

Of course using strobed light adds a layer of complexity to doing photography for several reasons. Using camera controlled TTL strobed light can be very inconsistant because the camera does not know what is being photographed or what artistic paln the photographer has. Exposure is controlled differently using strobed lighting compared to ambient only lighting.

It turns out that the least complex way to use strobed light is by having both the camera and the strobe light in manual mode.