Seven Steps To Better Exposure
Use the following steps as a guide
to achieving
better image
exposures
To always ensure better exposure in your images, following these easy seven steps ...
1.
Use the camera's metering system as a guide
:
For the most part your camera's metering system
will choose the
right exposure settings
for a scene. You will be able
to see the aperture
and shutter
settings
either in the viewfinder or on
the LCD screen.
Start to take notice of
these settings and recognise
Start to take notice of
these settings and recognise
how your camera reacts to different lighting conditions.
2.
Make sure your subject fills the image frame
:
The trick with most camera meters is that they use
the subject that appears in the center of a frame as a guide for the
exposure
of the whole image.
To ensure better
exposure of your image, make
sure that
The drawback of this method is that doing this all the
time can lead to monotonous image
compositions.
To ensure better
exposure of your image, make
sure that
the most important parts of the picture appear in the center
of the frame as they will be the ones used for the calculation of the
image exposure.
3.
Off-center subjects can lead to bad exposure:
So to be creative in your compositions you might
choose to feature
your subject a little off-center in the frame. But
how to you ensure that you have a good exposure? Most cameras have the
ability to lock exposure
(and focus)
by pushing down the shutter
realease button half way.
So what you need to do
is direct the camera
at the subject
So what you need to do
is direct the camera
at the subject
and press the shutter release button half way and then,
without removing
your finger, recompose the picture before pushing the button all the
way down to take the photograph.
4.
Watch out for dark subjects:
The camera's metering works by averaging the
various colours, tones and brightnesses in a scene. When there are dark
subjects in it, the camera will try to suggest settings that will make
the image too light (overexposed).
Knowing that you can
compensate for
it by either
Do not
forget that you
can alsways preview your result straight away on the LCD screen of your
camera and reshoot if necessary.
Knowing that you can
compensate for
it by either
increasing the shutter speed by one, or two speeds,
or
close down your aperture by a couple of f-stops.
5.
Watch out for light colour scenes:
Similar logic goes for light colour scenes such as
the pictures you take on holiday to the beach or the snow fields. If
you leave the camera to recommend the exposure, you will most pobably
end up with underexposed
(too dark) photographs
.
For the beach and
snow scenes add 1.0 or 1.5 stops using this control.
For achieving better exposure, the solution is to add more exposure using the same method as described in rule 4 or using the Exposure Compensation feature on your camera. This feature allows you add or subtract exposure by simply pressing and turning a command dial usually labeled with a small plus and minus sign.
6.
Watch out for backlighting:
Another
tricky scenario is to try and take a portrait with intesive light
in the background, for example, in
front of an open window with a beautiful sunlit scenary behind. More
often than not, the person will appear too dark as compared to the
background and spoil the
photograph. The reason the person appears too dark is because the
camera's meter has been fouled by the streaming light
in the background and has
recommended an exposure that has resulted in
an underexposed image
.
To
get better exposure increase the amount of
light
entering
the camera either manually, or with the exposure
To
get better exposure increase the amount of
light
entering
the camera either manually, or with the exposure
compensation
feature.
7.
Use histrograms to quickly find exposure problems
Use
to your advantage the fact that you can preview
your pictures immediately on the LCD screen on your camera. This means
that a lot of exposure mistakes can be avoided and corrected leading to overall better exposure results in your images. Any
under- and
over-exposure problems
can be compensated for on the spot
and retake the image. Many cameras also contain a build-in graphing
function, usually called a
histrogram
, which displays the spread of tones in your image.
A spike of pixels to the right-hand end of the graph means an underexposed image, a spike to the left end means overexposure.
Always be aware of these seven aspects and how you can correct for them to ensure you get a better exposure for your images .