Expose to the right - can someone explain this to an idiot (me!)

Hi,

Despite taking some fairly decent images I don't fully understand what I'm doing.

I understand exposing to the right to mean "expose" then use EV to get +1 or 2, all well and good but can someone break this down into terms I can easily follow?

Sorry of this should have been in the basic section but all I tend to do is set it to AV (if I want DoF) or TV (if I need to catch fast moving subjects) and the rest works itself out!

Cheers.

It refers to the Histogram.

There's a good explanation on another site - http://www.cambridgein​colour.com …l-exposure-techniques.htm

The thory being that the higher EV bands hold more information than the lower ones (see here for more details).

Cheers Mike - sounds like I'd better start using the histogram more.

I have the issue that I often take shots on the spur of the moment so is there a good way to preplan this as I often find once I raise the camera my kids play to the camera so I usually only get the first one or two shots of natural playing so don;t have time to check the histogram and adjust.

EDIT: Thanks too Armis - I was writing as you posted.

It comes down to practice really, but resetting your camera to a good base point each time you finish using it helps for the times when you need to grab it quickly.

Mikes suggestion, "resetting your camera to a good base point each time you finish" is a good one if the light is changing, & this method is faster for me: Need an exposure crutch?

Here's an easy way to "expose to the right":
http://daystarvisions.​com/Docs/Tuts/DCExp/pg​1.html

stsva wrote in post #14772678
Here's an easy way to "expose to the right":
http://daystarvisions.​com/Docs/Tuts/DCExp/pg​1.html

Pretty good article, and I kind of like the technique, but unless I skipped over something, what he doesn't take into account is the brightest portion of different scenes may not necessarily have the same tonality. In other words, the camera may not expose it properly if the tone is too dark or too light, so simply dialing in an EV won't give you what you're looking for.

In the end, I really think the best way to truly expose to the right is to find a manual exposure setting (or multiple settings if the light is changing) that will put your curve on the far right of the histogram.

IslandCrow wrote in post #14772727
Pretty good article, and I kind of like the technique, but unless I skipped over something, what he doesn't take into account is the brightest portion of different scenes may not necessarily have the same tonality. In other words, the camera may not expose it properly if the tone is too dark or too light, so simply dialing in an EV won't give you what you're looking for.

In the end, I really think the best way to truly expose to the right is to find a manual exposure setting (or multiple settings if the light is changing) that will put your curve on the far right of the histogram.

The technique was developed for high contrast scenes and therefore assumes a pretty bright "brightest portion", but knowing the exposure "headroom" for your (used generically, not referring to you, IslandCrow, personally) particular camera is helpful regardless of the overall tonality and contrast of the scene. In addition, since the camera's metering system assumes that the scene it's metering is 18% (as commonly understood, supposedly it's really closer to 12%) neutral gray, regardless of how dark or bright it really is, it automatically compensates for varying tonalities by adjusting the exposure up for a darker subject and down for a brighter subject, so that varying tonalities are essentially irrelevant in using this technique. In any event, if you want to tweak the exposure once you've dialed in the safe headroom amount of increased exposure that would be easy to do, but knowing the headroom amount gives you a known, safe starting point where you know that you won't over-expose by using the basic adjustment. You can always chimp the shot to check the histogram and then adjust as needed to move it to the right (assuming you have your camera set up to give a reasonably accurate histogram, preferably showing the RGB channels separately). Although I believe the expose to the right technique does improve image quality, I've got to admit I'm not obsessive about trying to get the histogram as far to the right as it will possibly go without truly over-exposing (in the sense of losing highlight detail). I find it easier just to apply this technique and not worry about the last 1/3 - 2/3 of a stop that I might be able to push the exposure.

John_N wrote in post #14771541
Cheers Mike - sounds like I'd better start using the histogram more.

I have the issue that I often take shots on the spur of the moment so is there a good way to preplan this as I often find once I raise the camera my kids play to the camera so I usually only get the first one or two shots of natural playing so don;t have time to check the histogram and adjust.

Expose to the right is not for grab shots of your kids. It is not for sports. It is not for street candids. It is not for studio portraits (where the lighting should determine the DR). It is frequently unnecessary with today's low noise cameras and irrelevent when DR is a secondary consideration - much less important than capturing the moment or telling the story.
ETTR is for landscape photography and similar situations where it is important to use all the DR the camera can capture, which will, in turn, maximize shadow detail and minimize shadow noise. It is also most appropriate when the landscape is to be printed reasonably large. And it is also really only viable when shooting in Raw and doing a conversion that exploits all that DR and returns the midrange tones to an appropriate level.

It seems that today many people who shoot for Facebook or photo-share sites or 4x6 prints are unnecessarily giving themselves ulcers worrying whether their photos are ETTRed enough because they heard that it will give them better photos, without really knowing in what respect they will be better. Any technique needs to be put into the proper perspective.

Thank you

I tried a bit with the kids today and found it was messing with my shutter speed something wicked as you would imagine and soon gave up. As suggested I'll try it next time I'm doing a landscape and thank you all for the help and advice.

Another way of looking at it is just 'don't under-expose'. Especially if you have to crank up the ISO.

Or - better to up the ISO and get something well exposed than use a lower ISO and increase exposure after.

It also doesn't apply to anyone who isn't doing some post processing.

John_N wrote in post #14771513
Hi,

Despite taking some fairly decent images I don't fully understand what I'm doing.

i'll tell you what, you practice with my 60d for a while and i'll hold onto your 5diii until you get the basics down

lol, now of course I would but you know international postage and all that