Photos at dusk - Nikon CP 5700

[a_n2]

Hey! I took a couple of photos at dusk and I'm having trouble with

the exposure. The thing is that if I focus on the subject, the sky

comes out over-exposed whereas if I focus on the sky, the subjects

come out quite dark. I've tried exposure compensation, but it doesn't

help that much. I also tried flash, but the subjects were too far

away.

 

Any ideas?

 

I'm attaching a couple of pictures so that you can see whatI'm

talking about.

 

Thanks in advance for your input.

[a_n2]

Second photo...

[efusco]

This is a fact of life/physics. Film or a digital sensor can only capture a certain range of light (latitude). When you have a dramatic difference in the brightness of one part of a scene as compared to another area something will always be over or under exposed. In the samples you gave most people would opt to spot meter the football players and allow the sky to be over exposed, or even crop out the sky completely to avoid the distraction.

 

There are some work arounds...for landscapes/scenics one can employ a Neutral density graduated filter which basicly blocks part of the light from the sky while allowing all the light available from the darker part of the scene to get the balance of light within the scene close enough for your capture device to record them.

 

You can simulate the effect, to a limited degree, by using the filters available in Photoshop by masking the sky and lightening the foreground. Just remember, it won't look perfect b/c you havent captured all the information in the original scene, but it will help and may make the images printable for daily use.

[gib]

You could try using some of the other metering options available with the 5700: matrix, spot, center-weighted, and spot AF area.

 

Another way to go...I tend to use matrix with exposure compensation set to -0.3 as my standard setting. But in other situations, I change the ex comp to +1.0 for snow scenes. Or for a flower that is white or yellow I experiment with exp comp set to -1.0 or -1.3 with matrix metering, or I may switch over from matrix metering to spot metering (with spot I would tend to set exp comp to 0.0 to start with).

 

Hope this is of some small help.

 

regards

Bill

[Brad_]

I think the first is still under exposed - for the subjects - the sky is

dominating, maybe other metering methods with compensation

could help. Also experimenting with a more powerful flash,

depending on distance to subject, circumstances, etc would

work. Here's a street shot I did in nyc a couple of weeks ago at

dusk with my sony. The flash attempts to bring the subjects to

the same level as what's dominating in the

background.<BR><P>

 

<center>

<IMG SRC=

"http://pages.sbcglobal.net/b-evans/IMAGES/NY-Flash.jpg">

</center>

[briany]

Evan's right.. it's not about metering. You can only capture so much range, whether film or digital. You can't capture both the detail in the bright sky and the comparatively dark foreground. You can increase the "power" of your flash by using a higher ISO setting, but this may not be enough. For film, people will often use an graduated ND filter so that the light sky is darkened appropriately so that more detail can be exposed in the dark foreground. With digital, you could try the filtering route. For landscapes though, set your camera on a tripod, take one shot exposing for the sky, another exposing for the foreground, and combine the pictures in Photoshop. For your football game, a filter over the sky may work, but it would probably be awkward and may be hard to come by for a digital camera size. Perhaps someone else knows if there's a Cokin style filter holder for your camera. I don't know what accessories the CoolPix takes, but a very powerful flash and higher ISO setting on your camera may help quite a bit.

[gib]

I would assume it is about metering...if the object is to get proper exposure for the players. The sky will have to go, if you want the players.

[gsbhasin]

I doubt that even print film could have done the job. There is a lot of difference between the sky and the players.

<p>I don't see how this could be solved except by putting on big lights on the field, like those in a stadium.

<p>As someone has suggested, you could have opened up more (Another 1.5 stops) and then cropped out the sky. That would have done it.