Metering street/ colour representation

Hi,

Let me say off the bat that I am living in Hong Kong...arguably the world's most polluted city. All winter the sky has been a sheet of white. There's no definable shape in the sky...no cloud forms...just a blanket of white. Lower to the ground there is a white haze of smog. Some days thick as an English sea fog...other days not as bad. Even the green trees seem to have a film of white/ grey smog/ residue over them. To say that colours here in Hong Kong are dull (discounting neon at night) is a bit of an understatement. There just isn't a rich deep blue sky/ lovely gradient blue sky as a backdrop...there's no beautiful white clouds off-setting that. Once in a blue moon this winter we have got rich blue skies. 98% of the time it is just terrible.

Having said that, let me ask a couple of questions.

My time in HK is coming to an end, and since I came here 4 years ago I always said that I will spend time on the street capturing the people and the local scenes. I've always wanted to document the local faces, the local life....so my first question is about metering.

I'm new to dslr

I use a 60D and a 35mm f2 or a 50mm 1.8 II for going around the street. I have found that using spot metering or a center based metering style (or any of the metering options for the 60D)...I've found that the results on the street are varied...a lot of shots seem to be overexposed...harsh whites...and I'm sure that's a result of the sky itself...which is an unforgiving white haze of smog. So, anyway...I'm looking for tips people may be able to offer for achieving a balance of dark and light when on the street in these hazy, white sky circumstances.

I guess I have been using Av mode, somewhere like f11 and focus on Auto...usually triggering off a face...as I want to capture people. Is there something that I should do/ can do prior to starting where I can more or less determine a range of settings...like white balance manually to the area (but that's problematic...or is it...due to the variety of lighting on a street)...should I manually set focus to achieve good focus for everything 4 feet in front of me? What metering mode? Spot? Evaluative?

I feel as if my shots are washed out (shooting in RAW)...and I keep thinking it is the environment...the streets themselves are drab, grey, colourless places (not all the time of course)....and the sky...the damn sky...everytime the sky is in shot it's just a disgusting blare of white haze.

I feel like the RAW images are kind of devoid of colour...I guess I am used to seeing the amped up jpegs of a Lumix P&S...I can of course manipulate the image in software...but I thought RAW would give me a rich representation anyway....and yeah...this is a problem owing to what I described about HK and the depressing white haze which seems to wash all colour out of everything. Even to the naked eye it's pretty drab...so I suppose the RAW shots aren't really lying.

So...I suppose that's about it...as a novice, sure I've done some reading...but thought I would start a thread to make my case a bit more specific and see what advice I could get.

I will post examples later...

thanks

PS...it kind of seems that the metering is so sensitive to where you aim. You meter a slightly dark area on a face or a shirt...and bang...it'll attempt to lighten these...at the expense of other areas already light...then these areas will be overexposed. You meter on a light place/ spot...and then suddenly it'll attempt to darken...there seems to be no easy way to balance dark and light given the metering modes and the quick action/ reflexive action of taking spur of the moment street type shots. This is my problem. Given what I have read...that's just the way it is.

Well, let's see, let's start with understanding how your meter works and how you can work with it.

As you've noted, the meter wants to brighten something dark or tamp down something light to make it "medium". How exactly it computes this differs from mode to mode but that's the idea.

So, in one of the Auto/Scene modes or in a semi-auto mode (P, Av, Tv) your camera will do that automatically and if you aren't in Av, Tv or P there's nothing you can do about it. For these "Creative" modes though you have Exposure Compensation and it is your friend. If you see your camera trying to brighten that dark tone, use EC to tone it down. Or, to tone up a light tone.

In some scenarios you may want to switch to Manual for more consistency. This is if you are facing a scene that shares a consistent light source and you are operating with one field of view in relation to the light source -- say the sun is behind you. You can set your aperture, shutter speed and ISO, check your histogram either in Live View or by "chimping" one or two test shots, and then you are good to go until you change your scene/field of view.

Whichever way you go requires some thought and, as you move along, keep an eye on things. Having the histogram come up on your Play/Review display is important.

As to your Raw files, true that many Raw converters default to a "flat" overall image look, but of course the power of Raw is being able to create your own image.

But, what Raw software are you using? For people new to Raw shooting (if they are shooting Canon) I strongly advise using the Canon Raw processing software Digital Photo Professional (DPP) -- it comes bundled with Canon DSLRs and is great for getting on your feet with Raw processing. A huge advantages for those new to this is that you can set your camera to a Picture Style and when you upload to DPP the software will use that same picture style as the initial preview as if you were looking at a jpeg, but even more powerful you are not "stuck" with a Picture Style the way a jpeg is -- you can jump around picture styles, White Balance, and tweak things to your heart's content and at no point does the Raw file/underlying image get damaged!

Well, enough for now, chew on that stuff and get back with more questions!

get up early

If you want to get a nice photo of the harbor view, try renting a hotel room with a harbor view. Take your photos very early in the morning (5~6AM) before the sun comes out. When the streets have fewer cars & the harbor has fewer ships you will see next to no haze in the sky even in the city center. Another good time to take photos is the day after a rainy day.

tonylong wrote in post #12014459
Well, let's see, let's start with understanding how your meter works and how you can work with it.

As you've noted, the meter wants to brighten something dark or tamp down something light to make it "medium". How exactly it computes this differs from mode to mode but that's the idea.

So, in one of the Auto/Scene modes or in a semi-auto mode (P, Av, Tv) your camera will do that automatically and if you aren't in Av, Tv or P there's nothing you can do about it. For these "Creative" modes though you have Exposure Compensation and it is your friend. If you see your camera trying to brighten that dark tone, use EC to tone it down. Or, to tone up a light tone.

In some scenarios you may want to switch to Manual for more consistency. This is if you are facing a scene that shares a consistent light source and you are operating with one field of view in relation to the light source -- say the sun is behind you. You can set your aperture, shutter speed and ISO, check your histogram either in Live View or by "chimping" one or two test shots, and then you are good to go until you change your scene/field of view.

Whichever way you go requires some thought and, as you move along, keep an eye on things. Having the histogram come up on your Play/Review display is important.

As to your Raw files, true that many Raw converters default to a "flat" overall image look, but of course the power of Raw is being able to create your own image.

But, what Raw software are you using? For people new to Raw shooting (if they are shooting Canon) I strongly advise using the Canon Raw processing software Digital Photo Professional (DPP) -- it comes bundled with Canon DSLRs and is great for getting on your feet with Raw processing. A huge advantages for those new to this is that you can set your camera to a Picture Style and when you upload to DPP the software will use that same picture style as the initial preview as if you were looking at a jpeg, but even more powerful you are not "stuck" with a Picture Style the way a jpeg is -- you can jump around picture styles, White Balance, and tweak things to your heart's content and at no point does the Raw file/underlying image get damaged!

Well, enough for now, chew on that stuff and get back with more questions!

I hear you...maybe using a manual setting is the best way to go...if I am in one area of the street...with the sun behind me or wherever. Before I start shooting I should make settings based on the light that is there. I am looking for consistency...I want to avoid having the camera make decisions about light based on a tiny area that it may meter off. I wish it could look at the entire frame and meter based on that. You know though...the street is fairly dynamic in terms of lighting...sometimes it's motley shade...all shade...dim...light...​hazy...more hazy...bright white sky...etc. I need to get a feel for how the camera meters...because to me at this stage it seems very picky and varied. I don;t like the way it will make blanket adjustments based on a 5% area. There is a metering mode called evaluative I think...I could try that. Metering modes are only applicable to the semi manual modes like Av and Tv? In what way does a dslr meter in full M mode?

I am using DPP for my RAW...I'll keep working at it

kwyml12106 wrote in post #12014480
If you want to get a nice photo of the harbor view, try renting a hotel room with a harbor view. Take your photos very early in the morning (5~6AM) before the sun comes out. When the streets have fewer cars & the harbor has fewer ships you will see next to no haze in the sky even in the city center. Another good time to take photos is the day after a rainy day.

I've taken some nice (with smog...rain works I guess...but when I wake in the morning...there IS smog. Lately it's been abominable) harbour shots...the nighttime stuff isn't so bad...you can work all the colouful lights and all that...what my post was about was the street...

hello people wrote in post #12014681
I hear you...maybe using a manual setting is the best way to go...if I am in one area of the street...with the sun behind me or wherever. Before I start shooting I should make settings based on the light that is there. I am looking for consistency...I want to avoid having the camera make decisions about light based on a tiny area that it may meter off. I wish it could look at the entire frame and meter based on that. You know though...the street is fairly dynamic in terms of lighting...sometimes it's motley shade...all shade...dim...light...​hazy...more hazy...bright white sky...etc. I need to get a feel for how the camera meters...because to me at this stage it seems very picky and varied. I don;t like the way it will make blanket adjustments based on a 5% area. There is a metering mode called evaluative I think...I could try that. Metering modes are only applicable to the semi manual modes like Av and Tv? In what way does a dslr meter in full M mode?

I am using DPP for my RAW...I'll keep working at it

OK, with DPP you should have a lot of latitude to mix things around. I know that Nikon has a rep for "flashy" jpegs, but I just don't feel the need.

Now, as to metering modes, they will affect the meter whether in Manual or not. But of course in modes other than Manual they will try to "dictate" what a proper exposure will be. And they will act differently. As you've noted, Evaluative will try to average out a scene, and a lot of times it will do a good job, but not always. The other modes will tend to go more and more toward Spot, where only a small area will be metered. Spot is best used with Manual or with a tight control of Exposure Compensation and Exposure Locking. Otherwise, as soon as you move your camera, your spot metering will be thrown off and so your Av/Tv/P settings will be thrown off.

Hey, you are on a journey! Take your time, get in as much reading as you can and as much practice as you can! Photography can be quick to get started in but believe it or not it takes time to just get the basics down!

Yeah good advice for sure tonylong...on Exposure Compensation...I guess that it can be good and bad on a street...with variable lighting conditions in the space of a few steps...alley ways/ smaller streets are dark...main road may be light...if I set EC to adjust for overly bright shots, that could hurt the shot in conditions that don't suit that EC. Walking around the street is a challenge. I read that even the good/ classic street photographers may have kept 1 out of a thousand shots...so...I'm not discouraged...just positively challenged.

Here's an example of a shot where the white sky I think looks terrible...hard to do much about that. I get similar results on the street as that white blaring haze

You mean like these taken in HK ?

Skies like that are certainly a headache! When I have conditions like that (which tends to be most of the year) I just look for scenes and compositions where the sky is at best a "minor actor" in the composition -- you can't turn that flat white sky into something photogenic so just learn to work around it and bring out the best of the scene.

You still will need to look at your light, though. In the shot with the sun coming through the trees, if that's what you wanted, well and good. It means, of course, that your range of tones will be all thrown off, underexposed foreground and such. But you still got that shot.

Now having that sun to your back would have brought out a whole different dynamic where you could bring out the rich colors of the woodsy foreground, and who cares about the sky?

'Avoid' is good enough for me....bobobird, are those shots with a film camera?

Nah, cannot afford the film. hehe

Just a plain 550D.

I see...quite nice a couple of them I think!

Wanna see some smog?

That isn't rain or a rain cloud

Yes, can get really bad. There are even public announcements at times for older people or those with respiratory problems to stay indoors.

Winter is the worst....prevailing winds come from the north (China) bringing smog. In summer the wind changes and it comes from the south...clearer, better. Winter is a cold hell.

Well I am well aware of your issue, I live in sweden where everything is gray/white from october/November to March/April. What I do is that I shoot in black and white. It is so hard getting good colours and light during the winter. It is usually very, very harsh light and it will not come out nice on the photos.