Working in Harsh Light

Any tips for working in harsh light - lovely bright sunny day at noon today,

photographing soccer - very hard to get decent balance shadow and light, even

playing around with the raw images. Any pro sports guys have a formula or

routine for what you do when forced to use harsh light?<div></div>

Sorry - attachment too large. Here it is smaller. This is about the best I could get in this light - using 70-200 lens on aperture control, around 2.8-4 ISO 100.

I'm not a pro sports guy and I will be happy to defer to higher authority, but the basic problem here isn't a sports problem, it's the standard problem of shooting in bright daylight. The standard solutions are (1) shoot to the right of the histogram as far as you can without blowing highlights and (2) use fill-flash. By shooting to the right, you give yourself the ability to pull down the tone curve a bit in post-processing.

 

As for flash, I don't know whether flash photography is allowed at amateur sports events that take place outdoors. If it is, then give it a try. I shoot a lot of indoor sports and flash is definitely verboten there. I'd be ecstatic if I had the problems you have in the shot you posted.

 

A neutral density filter might help, too, but I'm not good with filters and would like someone else to confirm or correct that suggestion.

Lower ISO film are usually of higher contrast. Perhaps using a bit less contrasty film could help.

 

If using digital camera, try to bracket exposure, and select one of the series that pleases you most.

Given you are playing with raw I know that film choice is out the window here.

 

William is right but forget the flash option I doubt you will be allowed to use it. The attached looks ok, no blown highlights and the players are exposed well. I don't use filters as they cut down speed but it's your call here, too much light is always better than not enough make sure you expose the players well and the rest will fall in line.

 

A larger app will blur the background more and keep the eye looking at the action here better.

 

Nice job.

 

cheers

 

Mark

Yes I am using Digital (Nikon D200) shooting in RAW.

 

I certainly could use a flash, but I would guess that from the distance I am shooting from it would be pretty ineffectual - even a Nikon SB800. Could try, though.

 

The example I posted is one of the best I was able to get today - still pretty contrasty, I thought. Here is one that was NOT so good - first unedited, then the second one with Raw settings changed - Exposure, Fill Light, and Blacks each increased a bit.

Second shot here.

 

I really have little idea what I am doing here, and just fiddled a bit to make it look better. Of course the topic is a general one, but the reason I thought a sports pro might have a "set routine" for these conditions is that you have to take sports photos when they are scheduled - landscape is different - I can get up early or stay late to adjust the light to my liking, but the game is on when it's on. Editors don't care if light was harsh, I imagine - they just want the shots. So, I was wondering if there are some sort of regular routines people use to deal with harsh light.

Where's Wilson? He always has excellent suggestions.

 

Overall, you've done well with your adjustments.

 

I face similar conditions when I shoot my kids' soccer games. Sometimes I position myself to get different effects. Try shooting toward the sun sometime (use a lens shade). You can get an interesting rim light. But you will need to bring up the players' faces as they are in shadow.

 

Forget fill flash - usually too much distance and you'll need too much light to balance the sun.

John,

the second shot looks good to me. I am using a D200 too for soccer. There is not much you

can do in harsh light. I try to get a clean background and use the lens wide open. I do a lot of

postprocessing including dodge and burn. Maybe the newer Nikons will do better in handling

extreme contrast situations. Georg.

I'm not a pro either, and I agree with a lot of what has already been posted - adjust the iso, or the shutter speed, to eliminate the blown highs, then fiddle with the levels on the computer. I don't spend very long with most of my pictures, and only adjust a few that I especially like, so it is not a workflow problem for me.

 

In my opinion, the shadow in the first incarnation of the second picture is not a defect - I would have left it.

 

Also, sometimes I get better results when I use a custom white balance, set in the sunlight. But usually auto white balance is fine.

John, given the condition you had to shoot in, I'd say you did great in term of exposure, particularly in balancing the shadow and highlight area.

 

Couple things you can do to balance out the shadow and highlight further, which I'm sure some might had already mentioned above, are use of balanced fill-flash (quite limiting due to often too great of camera-to-subject distance in sports,) or make the harsh light to work for you by shooting into the light (as in back lighting.) Shooting back-lit make those harsh, burnt out highlights act as rim-light around your subjects and give you lots of shadow details. You'll have to make sure to dial up exposure a bit and watch out for contrast robbing flares. I personally find that shooting back-lit is the best solution for the situation you described.

 

Having said that, in sports, I'm sure you might not always have the perfect back lighting to shoot all the time and therefore if you have to compromise between highlight and shadow exposure, I think that you did the right thing by letting go of the highlight and keeping the shadow and the general scene well exposed.<div></div>

Thanks for the advice - I have avoided backlit shooting in really bright sunlight, thinking it would be worse - will give it a try.

As for white balance, I have to say I have learned something - the D200 has really quite amazing automatic white balance - it almost always seems to be better than the programmed white balance - I note that Ken Rockwell commented upon how well it works - and I have to say I have been impressed by this - I have made a lot of use of custom white balance with an expodisc shooting in gyms - with really awful lighting. But the auto WB really seems to work well, and even playing in RAW with CS3, it almost always seems to be better than the presets.

 

I will try backlit shots this weekend. Lots of fun, I must say.