 Linda Kessler |
How to Shoot Black Velvet and White Sand If I am shooting a portrait of a woman wearing black with texture how do I expose to get detail, with no flash? Do I expose using a grey card like I usually do? Also, the same for photographing white as in The White Sands Monument. I lost all detail in the dunes when using a grey card. I prefer no flash. One more question, how do I avoid distortion in getting closeups of a family when the people are at the edges of the photo? Thanks, Linda Kessler
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Mark Feldstein |
Greetings Linda: Understand that light meters are basically "gray meters" seeing the world as though everything were painted medium gray. Using a gray card, while often a good idea, will still produce readings as though the object you're photographing is that shade of 18% gray (or thereabouts) not pure white like some kinds of sand or snow for that matter, or even black. And Gray card readings may produce under or overexposed images. One way to avoid this is to set your camera in the automatic mode, use your gray card, placed in the scene with the lighting falling on it, zoom in on the card filling your viewfinder with it, take a reading and lock that into your camera. Then go to the manual mode and using the reading you got, shoot the scene. If you left it in auto mode, the camera would reset itself for the scene, get fooled, and give you an inaccurate exposure. Sometimes you need to manually make adjustments for the brightness level in a scene, let's say for example because there are different shades of snow, depending on the time of day you shoot, whether the snow is dirty not exactly pure white. So you may need to open up an extra stop or so to compensate for that. Same is true of black. Bracket your exposures a bit while you get the hang of interpreting your meter's results. My own preference is to use a hand held meter that will take readings of the light actually falling on the subject and that eliminates the need for the gray card, metering with the camera, locking it in etc. This is called an incident reading rather than reflected. An "incident light meter" will measure the amount of light actually falling on the subject rather than reflected light which is what your camera's meter is going to measure. The way to avoid distortion of people, particularly when shooting portraits with a wide angle lens is to change to a standard lens, something in the 35-70mm range, or move them more into the center of the frame.
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W. |
"If I am shooting a portrait of a woman wearing black with texture how do I expose to get detail, with no flash?" Linda, the laws of physics dictate that you will get max texture detail – relief – with a light source 90 degrees off the camera's axis.
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Linda Kessler |
Mark F. and W.S., Guys, thanks a bunch ~ great advice!!! Linda
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Michael H. Cothran |
You are dealing with the physical limitations of your digital sensor or film to record detail from dark to light. This is referred to as the contrast range. Consider that a 5-6 stop range is about all you have. I suspect that black velvet and white sand in the same lighting is going to be greater than 5-6 stops, which means that you cannot hold detail at both ends. A graduated neutral density filter will not work for your particular situation either. Neither will taking two different pictures at different exposures since the wind may blow the woman's attire, and/or she may also move slightly, so combining the two in PS would not work either. Remember - if there is no detail recorded at the time of exposure, there is nothing you can do about it in PS. Best way to find out is to use a spot meter on the black velvet, and then on the sand. If the difference is greater than 5 stops, you're probably dead in the water right there. If it's less, then you have a chance, providing you use the best exposure to cover both. In general, brights wash out about 2.5 stops above middle gray, and darks turn muddy about 2.5 - 3 stops under. This of course, assumes that your meter is factory calibrated to accurately place middle gray on middle gray. Most camera meters aren't, and this would require additional testing to determine exactly where your meter places middle gray (Zone V). As to your second inquiry about face distortion at the edges - this is caused by using a wide angle lens. The closer your subject is to the edge, the more stretched it will become. Solution - do not use a wide angle lens. There is no other way. If your subjects won't all fit in the view finder without a wide angle lens, find a new place to shoot where you can use a longer lens. That's all you can do. Michael H. Cothran
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Linda Kessler |
Mark F. I always knew to take a reading off of a grey card in the shade, not light. I will get a light meter. Any suggestions, Sekonic. Want something simple. Michael C. The black velvet and white sands are from two different shoots. Just need to know how to shoot detail in black and get a rich black and shoot detail in white with detail. I am shooting film, not digital. Thanks, Linda K.
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Mark Feldstein |
Howdy Linda. I've had a Minolta Flash Meter IV that I really like a lot. It does ambient, transient I guess I knew the black vs. white sand were two different shoots. If you're shooting transparency film, you need to underexpose by about 1/2 stop, or factor that in to your bracketing. Color negative film, overexposing by 1 stop or so gives better saturation. For black and white, expose for the shadows and some detail there, and have the film processed for the highlighted areas. (I didn't know if you knew this stuff so I tossed it in ;>). Let me know about the meter PDF.
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