What happened?

[lizheaemma]

Now sure what happened here?
She is in the water...
Thoughts....

 

[AgentDrex]

You shot at midday and have a light source straight above the subject. It washed everything out...

If you used an auto exposure it compensated for the dark areas in the child's face and blew everything else out-of-the-water (pardon the pun)

 

[Boomn4x4]

I'd be almost willing to bet a paycheck that you spot metered on the focal point.. that being the eyes. Her face is property exposed... the harsh midday bright sunlight is blown out.

 

[oldmacman]

You shot at midday and have a light source straight above the subject. It washed everything out...

If you used an auto exposure it compensated for the dark areas in the child's face and blew everything else out-of-the-water (pardon the pun)

Actually, I think the fact that it is so washed out indicates she metered something quite dark, like the shadow created by the open mouth. If you had the camera on spot metering, the mouth is pretty much middle of the frame.

 

[lizheaemma]

I was on manual....I may have metered off her mouth... I have a few like this and then some with very similar settings, but the background isn't blown out...
Probably couldn't do this if I tried though!

 

[Scatterbrained]

Try turning your back to the sun and metering off of the blue sky, then dial it up to about +2/3. That should give you a good starting point in a situation like this. Or you could carry a gray card and use that to set you exposure. A CPL would help to cut down the glare off of the water as well.

 

[lizheaemma]

It was around 3:00 pm, but a sunny sunny day. Thanks guys I really appreciate your advice! It was in a ... large puddle in a island, so there was lots of water surrounding. us.