metering help please

[BethG]

The photo below is unedited. I simply saved the RAW file to .jpg and resized it for upload. For the life of me I can't figure out how to keep from blowing out the highlights. Can someone please help me? I tried underexposing by a stop and that didn't work either. Should I have overexposed?

1/25th sec @ f8.0, ISO 100

thanks
Beth

[ClintDMc]

Well one thing you can do, is raise your Exposure compensation. You can turn your Highlight warning on, on your canon, take a shot, then study the shot for the "blinkies", the black areas blinking at your telling you that they are blown out. Then you start stepping your EV comp up till you no longer have the blinkies.

[BethG]

Originally Posted by ClintDMc

Well one thing you can do, is raise your Exposure compensation. You can turn your Highlight warning on, on your canon, take a shot, then study the shot for the "blinkies", the black areas blinking at your telling you that they are blown out. Then you start stepping your EV comp up till you no longer have the blinkies.

Yes I look at the blinkies but I though I moved the EC up instead of down....hope that solves my frustration! thanks for the help

[ClintDMc]

Well I'm trying to remember if the "-" means under exposed, or over exposed. I have not played with EV comp that much to know right off the top of my head. But I think if you go to the "+" end you are under exposing. Could be wrong though, just have to play with it and find out.

[Patti Edens]

To stop blowing highlights, you have to underexpose. I tried to use the recovery tool to recover detail in the highlights, but there is no detail at all in those highlights. This is a huge dynamic range. You would probably have to underexpose by 2 or 3 stops. If I were trying to shoot this, I would either

1. Position me or the car so that the bright highlights were not there, for example, shoot from higher up or shoot the other direction. or

2. Underexpose until no more blinkies in the highlight area and use a fill flash to light up the car, or

3. Shoot three or more images at varying exposures to get the highlights exposed correctly, the car exposed correctly and the shadows exposed correctly and then either hand blend them together using Photoshop or blend with Photomatix.

But, while I had the image in Photoshop, I thought I'd play. Hope you don't mind. I just found this Gavin Hoey Out of Bounds tutorial and your photo looked like a perfect one to play with. Obviously I didn't spend a lot of time with the selections since it is only low res, but I had fun.

I'll pull it down if you don't like it. Just let me know.

[BethG]

Originally Posted by Patti Edens

To stop blowing highlights, you have to underexpose. I tried to use the recovery tool to recover detail in the highlights, but there is no detail at all in those highlights. This is a huge dynamic range. You would probably have to underexpose by 2 or 3 stops. If I were trying to shoot this, I would either

1. Position me or the car so that the bright highlights were not there, for example, shoot from higher up or shoot the other direction. or

2. Underexpose until no more blinkies in the highlight area and use a fill flash to light up the car, or

3. Shoot three or more images at varying exposures to get the highlights exposed correctly, the car exposed correctly and the shadows exposed correctly and then either hand blend them together using Photoshop or blend with Photomatix.

But, while I had the image in Photoshop, I thought I'd play. Hope you don't mind. I just found this Gavin Hoey Out of Bounds tutorial and your photo looked like a perfect one to play with. Obviously I didn't spend a lot of time with the selections since it is only low res, but I had fun.

I'll pull it down if you don't like it. Just let me know.

That's pretty cool! I'd love to know how you did it! Thanks for the tips too!

[hhscr]

You could also use higher shutter speed to remove the blown out highlights and then use a fill flash to expose the subject. This is not to hard with the new ttl flashes.

[CincoJoe]

Originally Posted by hhscr

You could also use higher shutter speed to remove the blown out highlights and then use a fill flash to expose the subject. This is not to hard with the new ttl flashes.

With the extreme back lighting you have here fill flash is going to be your best option. This example is no different than shooting a person with the sun directly behind them.