digital flare?

[rapierphoto]

On occasion when using film during a location shoot with a white backround if my backround lights were set at too strong of a power I would get a result that I called flare. The images were very flat and had no contrast. It seemed as if the reflection from the white backround came and wrapped around the subject. Now I have photographed dance schools digitally (with the 10D) and had two backrounds, one white and the other an outdoorsy scene. The color and skin tones on the outdoors backround looked great. The color on the white backround bounced around a bit and in some cases looked like the flare that I mentioned before using film. I am wondering if it could be flare or if the white backround somehow confuses the auto white balance of the camera.

TIA,
John Rapier

[teddynet]

It's most likely to be flare, the problem with the 1.6X multiplier is that your lens can see a lot more than the sensor is capturing and a highlight just out of frame is still close enough to cause lens flare. Couple that with the fact that we're all using wider angle zooms with larger front elements and flare can be a real problem, especially if you have a filter on the lens.

What kind of ISO were you using, I've noticed more flare caused by brightly lit white objects that were part of the subject itself when using higher ISO settings. Were you metering for the subject and allowing the background to blow out?

Rich.

[PaulB]

This is something which I have also noticed, flat images when photographing against a very bright background.

I have also started to understand, and been trying to get others to understand, that it is the whole of the lens which makes the image and not just the part which hits the 10D sensor.

So lots of this softness in images could be traced back to flare/aberrations/or whatever which, whilst they do not appear in the centre of the image (as used by the 10D sensor) DO have some effect on it.

[rapierphoto]

You know I never thought about the 1.6x factor and what you said about the lens seeing more than the sensor is capturing. I was shooting at iso 400 and yes I was trying to blow out the backround.

John Rapier

[Morden]

It's most likely to be flare, the problem with the 1.6X multiplier is that your lens can see a lot more than the sensor is capturing and a highlight just out of frame is still close enough to cause lens flare.

An excellent point that had not occured to me. I will take this into account when composing shots in the future!