Pages: [1] 2 3   Go Down

Author Topic: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops  (Read 20266 times)

Isaac

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 3123
underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« on: September 17, 2015, 02:09:46 pm »

Any suggestions on why this might be a good idea? (Seems counter to the advice I've seen on LuLa and elsewhere.)

Quote
You'll notice that the raw (out-of-camera) file is underexposed …

This is something I do when photographing landscapes because I prefer to use the available dynamic range rather than shooting for HDR or using a neutral density filter. I generally underexpose landscape images by two to three stops.

p222 The Photoshop Workbook, Glyn Dewis
Logged

Justinr

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1733
    • Ink+images
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #1 on: September 17, 2015, 02:52:30 pm »

Any suggestions on why this might be a good idea? (Seems counter to the advice I've seen on LuLa and elsewhere.)

I can certainly understand the reasoning if there is sky involved as cloud texture and colour can be so easily lost. TBH if I want a decent sky in any sort of picture then I expose for that element and hope the subject itself is recoverable. Sometimes it obviously won't be so you have grit your teeth and accept a dull white blanket instead.
Logged

walter.sk

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1433
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #2 on: September 17, 2015, 03:03:21 pm »

Basically, he is exposing for the sky, assuming that it is so bright that it would appear blown out with a normal autoexposure setting.  Essentially, he is using exposure compensation.  2 to 3 stops seems a bit drastic to me, though.
Logged

AlterEgo

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1995
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #3 on: September 17, 2015, 03:21:58 pm »

did he say how does he meter - camera matrix metering ? or spot metering ? if he is spot metering off the brightest spot he wants to have any details there and dials in the positive expocorrection then why he uses the wording "underexpose" to confuse our Isaac  8) ?
Logged

Jack Hogan

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 798
    • Hikes -more than strolls- with my dog
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #4 on: September 17, 2015, 03:53:39 pm »

Any suggestions on why this might be a good idea? (Seems counter to the advice I've seen on LuLa and elsewhere.)

I say ETTR, you say underexposure, I say IQ, you say gray card, potato, potato, tomato, tomato, let's call the whole thing off...
Logged

Telecaster

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 3686
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #5 on: September 17, 2015, 03:56:09 pm »

With the early Canon D-SLRs I usually underexposed a bit, especially when it came to skies with any textural detail or obvious tonal gradation. Those cameras tended to flatten highlight tonality. In a narrow-tonal-range scene I'd often go with –2 stops (below the camera's blinkie warning, that is) to stay out of the "flattened zone." But if I wanted good low-mid/shadow delineation I'd expose for that and let the highlights get smushed or even blow. Nowadays I have much less of a transparency film mentality. I'm more interested in those low-mids & shadows, and as a result I often blow highlights with impunity.

-Dave-
« Last Edit: September 17, 2015, 03:58:51 pm by Telecaster »
Logged

ErikKaffehr

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 11311
    • Echophoto
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #6 on: September 17, 2015, 04:31:59 pm »

Hi,

My take is that we need to avoid clipping non specular highlights. I mostly base my exposures on the histograms. It is a good exercise to check out raw histograms with a program like RawDigger.

Just to say, histograms in Lightroom are not to be trusted and the same applies to Capture One.

Best regards
Erik


I say ETTR, you say underexposure, I say IQ, you say gray card, potato, potato, tomato, tomato, let's call the whole thing off...
Logged
Erik Kaffehr
 

BernardLanguillier

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 13983
    • http://www.flickr.com/photos/bernardlanguillier/sets/
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #7 on: September 17, 2015, 04:38:15 pm »

Even with a sky just short of blinking highlights in camera, you are probably less than 1 stop under exposed relative to ideal raw ETTR.

I cannot see any justification for recommending to under exposed 2-3 stops.

This advise seems very misleading to me, especially if you work with a limited DR body.

Cheers,
Bernard

AlterEgo

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1995
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #8 on: September 17, 2015, 04:43:36 pm »

Even with a sky just short of blinking highlights in camera, you are probably less than 1 stop under exposed relative to ideal raw ETTR.

I cannot see any justification for recommending to under exposed 2-3 stops.

This advise seems very misleading to me, especially if you work with a limited DR body.

Cheers,
Bernard

so may be he spotmeters the some darkest place in the frame when he still needs a good (ok, acceptable, passable) S/N and then dials in 2-3 stops of negative exposure correction, that explains his choice of the wording  ::)
Logged

Isaac

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 3123
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #9 on: September 17, 2015, 04:44:55 pm »

mea culpa I should know by now that no one will look at the source material :-)

The context is a 4am sunrise photo.
« Last Edit: September 17, 2015, 05:01:43 pm by Isaac »
Logged

Justinr

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1733
    • Ink+images
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #10 on: September 17, 2015, 04:52:54 pm »

mea culpa I should know by now that no one will look at the source material :-)

The context is a 4am sunrise photo.

But that link just shows us a rhino wandering aimlessly across a barren landscape, which is quite apt in a way
Logged

Isaac

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 3123
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #11 on: September 17, 2015, 05:01:21 pm »

If you don't see the blue link "Page 221" to click, use the search box "4 a.m. to catch the sunrise".
Logged

digitaldog

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 20630
  • Andrew Rodney
    • http://www.digitaldog.net/
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #12 on: September 17, 2015, 07:11:49 pm »

Any suggestions on why this might be a good idea? (Seems counter to the advice I've seen on LuLa and elsewhere.)
In the context provided, it makes no sense. Now the sky is part of the image so exposure for the sky is part of the total picture. If there's something in the sky that you don't want clipped, by all means expose less for that area of the image! That may mean the 'landscape' itself is two-three stops less than the sky, fine. But if the casual reader feels the idea is to under expose all landscapes or that ETTR or better, OEFR optimal exposure for raw isn't pertinent, they've been fooled.
Logged
http://www.digitaldog.net/
Author "Color Management for Photographers".

fdisilvestro

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1852
    • Frank Disilvestro
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #13 on: September 17, 2015, 11:45:48 pm »

The author provides only a rendered image as the proof that the image is underexposed, which is close to nothing. The only way to see if the raw is underexposed or not will be using a tool like RawDigger, than can display  raw values.

Maybe this is the author's experience based on trial and error to be safe and avoid blown highlights. In general I think this is not good advice.

... OEFR optimal exposure for raw isn't pertinent, they've been fooled.

Sorry I'm lost. What is OEFR?

Jimbo57

  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 180
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #14 on: September 18, 2015, 03:50:04 am »

For a recent landscape shot into the (shaded) sun, I was surprised to find that using Nikon's highlight-weighted metering, I got a reading that was 5 (yes, 5) stops below that indicated by matrix metering.

The Raw file looked horrible and my first thought was "that will never work".

But pulling the Shadows slider in Lightroom all the way to the right brought out the detail in the shadows while leaving the highlights unblown.

As I say, I was surprised.
Logged

Justinr

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1733
    • Ink+images
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #15 on: September 18, 2015, 04:35:55 am »

For a recent landscape shot into the (shaded) sun, I was surprised to find that using Nikon's highlight-weighted metering, I got a reading that was 5 (yes, 5) stops below that indicated by matrix metering.

The Raw file looked horrible and my first thought was "that will never work".

But pulling the Shadows slider in Lightroom all the way to the right brought out the detail in the shadows while leaving the highlights unblown.

As I say, I was surprised.

I always feel that dramatic correction such as this always introduces an artificial look into the picture. Colours and contrast are all distorted and of course noise can become an issue. Purely from a subjective point of view I feel that altering any part of an image by more than two or three stops in relation to another can cause an overall imbalance that just looks wrong.
Logged

Schewe

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6229
    • http:www.schewephoto.com
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #16 on: September 18, 2015, 06:34:17 am »

Any suggestions on why this might be a good idea?

Because he's a putz?

Look, if one has half a clue what it means for optimal digital exposure, one doesn't do any knee jerk exposure by lowering the photon count. While one can bring up the shadows (or lower the highlights) it really optimal to make the exposure optimal for the scene (and maybe bracket) to get the best final rendering one can. But intentionally under exposing is pretty backwards...
Logged

MarkL

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 475
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #17 on: September 18, 2015, 08:10:45 am »

Any suggestions on why this might be a good idea? (Seems counter to the advice I've seen on LuLa and elsewhere.)

Exposure for the highlights otherwise you lose them. This is a typical situation with a landscape with a sky in it which, with film, we'd use ND grads to sort out. Now, a better alternative is to take two exposures and blend them in post. I often stitch landscapes with multi-rows of variable exposure so each frame is well exposed. Dynamic range never really becomes an issue then.
Logged

Rob C

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 24074
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #18 on: September 18, 2015, 11:57:01 am »

Exposure for the highlights otherwise you lose them. This is a typical situation with a landscape with a sky in it which, with film, we'd use ND grads to sort out. Now, a better alternative is to take two exposures and blend them in post. I often stitch landscapes with multi-rows of variable exposure so each frame is well exposed. Dynamic range never really becomes an issue then.


Yes, Mark, but stitching is something pretty specialised (or is to me!) and not a useful in-the-field sort of way out of a problem. I suppose that blending in PS is also a bit of an added problem, and I, for one, would far rather find the single-shot ideal. Obviously, if computer time is part of the pleasure, that's something else and I understand that might be the case.

I think the 'reasonable' thing is to do as with tranny: decide which highlight area is most important and base exposure on that.

I believe that the more interesting landscapes that I see are interesting, very often, precisely because of the sky/cloud look they happen to have rather than because of the solid matter. In reality, our own eyes often hide shadow detail to reveal the wonders of the firmament to greater advantage i.e. contre jour work.

Rob C

TwistedShadow

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 37
Re: underexpose landscape images by 2 to 3 stops
« Reply #19 on: September 19, 2015, 08:58:32 pm »

I'm not sure about underexposing 2-3 stops, maybe 1 but probably no more. Thats why I keep a 2 stop graduated filter in my bag.
Logged
Pages: [1] 2 3   Go Up