Digital Rebel question

[Blaine]

I'm new here and also new to the drebel,can someone please tell me the best way to get the landscape and sky properly exposed in an outdoor photo? Thank you very much.

Blaine

[DocFrankenstein]

:lol: :lol: :lol:

get out while you can!

RUN!

[ejwebb]

Unfortunately, what you want to do is not always possible. Camera sensors (and film) are limited in the amount of variance in brightness that they can handle (dynamic range).

Often the difference in the brightness between the sky and the land is too great for the camera to handle. In those situations you must choose which is more important for the image. If you meter on the sky the land will become a silhouette and if you meter on the land the sky gets blown out.

There are a few ways around this:

1. Use a split neutral density filter on your lens - these filters are half dark and gradually go to clear. By darkening the sky but not the land you can bring the brigthness closer together so that the sensor can handle it. Try this link: http://www.photofocus.com/zine2/zine9.htm

2. Take duplicate images (with a tripod) - meter one on the sky and one on the land - and combine them in Photoshop. I have never tried this but check this out: http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/digital_split.shtml

You have encountered one of the "laws" of photography by which we all abide. There are others...

Have fun learning - you have a great camera.

[ohenry]

Despite Doc Frankenstein's advice, I would suggest that you read as much as you can regarding exposure. Two excellent books that I can recommend are Understanding Exposure by Bryan Petersen and Perfect Exposure by Jim Zuckerman. Both of these books should be available at your local bookstore or Amazon.com for a reasonable price.

You could also take a look at http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/understanding-series/understandexposure.shtml and http://www.photo.net/learn/making-photographs/exposure for a start.

Welcome to the forum and the DRebel.

[c0ntr0lz]

Blaine
what are you having trouble with? getting the sky to look like the sky you see? hit the filters market, about the only way to get the blue skys we love and still get nice colors in the landscape. or just take photos at sunrise and sunset.

[ejwebb]

I think c0ntr0lz is making reference to filters such as polarizing filters - which darken the sky in certain situations and are useful for other effects as well. Check out:

http://www.photographic.com/phototechniques/101/index3.html

[cmM]

2. Take duplicate images (with a tripod) - meter one on the sky and one on the land - and combine them in Photoshop. I have never tried this but check this out: http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/digital_split.shtml

You can replace that method with shooting RAW. You have a couple stops to go up and down when shooting RAW and just convert twice using different exposure settings and then blend them in photoshop.

All this we talk about above is when you run out of dynamic range. This happens a lot especially with digital, but it doesn't happen all the time. When the difference in brightness is not too big, one exposure is enough, and polarizers will help.

[ejwebb]

Thanks, cmN. I have not ventured into RAW yet and had not thought of that. Great reason to use RAW for certain shots!

[tofuboy]

Here is a picture I 'saved' using the technique that cmM and ejwebb talked about. I took only one exposure in RAW which was metered about half for sky and half for the foreground. As a result, the original had a bit of a light sky and a bit of a dark foreground. I followed the technique from the link posted, and this is the result. It could be better, but it's not too bad for the short time it took... and it's better than the original :)

http://photography.tofuboy.net/Mt_Rainier/Sunrise/CRW_4653.jpg.html

I have sense bought a split ND filter, but haven't gotten a chance to use it yet. And if you have the patience (time to convert the images) to shoot in RAW, I would recommend doing so.

[Blaine]

Thank You all very much,I will try this method using photoshop.I may have some more questions for you guys from time to time if thats okay.

Blaine