poll: Any RAW shooters shoot to the left for shutter speed?

Shooting RAW but deliberately underexposing, in order to keep shutter speed higher, is a good news-bad news story. The good news is that you can hand hold to lower light levels without relying upon IS. The bad new is that it adds noise in the underexposed areas.

I shoot in RAW and use Lightroom for boulk processing. To purposely underexpose is crazy, in my book.

Exposing to the left is like using a higher ISO, except that hardware ISO's give better results. When you get to the highest ISO your camera has and it's still not enough, you just bite the bullet and underexpose.

I usually shoot jpegs. Burst mode takes more, I fot more on my card, it writes to the card faster... Sure I don't get the exposure latitude, but I try to get my shots right in camera as much as I can, and I only do minor post work.

But if I'm shooting tricky situations, I will shoot in RAW.

tzalman wrote in post #5566433
Exposing to the left is like using a higher ISO, except that hardware ISO's give better results. When you get to the highest ISO your camera has and it's still not enough, you just bite the bullet and underexpose.

i guess im just trying to shoot in light thats not shootable. i tried it this morning and it worked to a degree. but i ended up with shots that i couldent add enough exposure to. and i was only shooting at -1. from now on ill just struggle shooting with the proper exposure. cuz doing this didnt help.

mrbass111 wrote in post #5562086
his theory was that its easier to add exposure to raw rather than to try to darken an overexposed photos

I'm a raw shooter with no special adjustments unless I am shooting at high ISO. Then I tend to also shoot manual and over expose just a tad as well. He is right in that if you do overexpose too much, you've lost the detail. The trick is no not overexpose too much.

mrbass111 wrote in post #5567483
i guess im just trying to shoot in light thats not shootable. i tried it this morning and it worked to a degree. but i ended up with shots that i couldent add enough exposure to. and i was only shooting at -1. from now on ill just struggle shooting with the proper exposure. cuz doing this didnt help.

I'm not sure I understand why you couldn't add enough exposure if you were only shooting at -1?

On the XT, you can get an equivalent of ISO 6400 by underexposing by 2 stops and then bumping by 2 stops in post when shooting RAW. An ISO 3200 shot equivalent shot (-1 stop underexposure) will be roughly equivalent to ISO 3200 on the 20D from a noise perspective.

It cleans up reasonably well with something like Neat Image or Noiseware.

So if you can stand the noise, then underexpose by the -2 so you can bump your shutter speed up by 2. I'm assuming you already have your aperture wide open.

e-k

mrbass111 wrote in post #5567483
i guess im just trying to shoot in light thats not shootable. i tried it this morning and it worked to a degree. but i ended up with shots that i couldent add enough exposure to. and i was only shooting at -1. from now on ill just struggle shooting with the proper exposure. cuz doing this didnt help.

I think it would help everybody to give you meaningful advice if you posted some examples of your shots, together with details of shutter speed, aperture and ISO.

Roy Mathers wrote in post #5568221
I think it would help everybody to give you meaningful advice if you posted some examples of your shots, together with details of shutter speed, aperture and ISO.

ok heres the first shot i took this am. -1 ap. shutter speed 1000, f 5.6. iso 1600, 417mm range.

HTTP response: 404 | MIME changed to 'image/gif' | Byte size: ZERO | PHOTOBUCKET ERROR IMAGE

Well, that is obviously underexposed, and I doubt that you would need those exposure settings at 1600 ISO in daylight. What was the light like?

Roy Mathers wrote in post #5568403
Well, that is obviously underexposed, and I doubt that you would need those exposure settings at 1600 ISO in daylight. What was the light like?

no it was very dim. about 7 am. shutterspeed was amped up due to shooting up in the sky. if i was shooting at eye level i would have had a shutter speed of 60

mrbass111 wrote in post #5568486
no it was very dim. about 7 am. shutterspeed was amped up due to shooting up in the sky. if i was shooting at eye level i would have had a shutter speed of 60

1/60s at 400mm without IS... I'm hoping you were using a tripod or you're very steady in your hands.
And I must say that I don't see a reason to underexpose like that in such a situation.

I shoot RAW+JPG becuase i hate having to process every single mundane snapshot... For those, i just delete the raws on the computer to save space.

If i get a good shot or two, i use the raw, and process it as it deserves to be processed.

I love having the quick and easy snapshot once in a while. i hate doing a ton of extra work on every single shot. i tried it for a while, and RAW only didn't work for me.


another thing to consider, which bit me in the butt. You cant open a raw file on some computers... Like maybe a hotel computer, a friends computer, library, etc. i did a photo shoot for a customer, and couldn't proof them on location. Minor, but still a hassle.

mrbass111 wrote in post #5560003
i was talking to a photographer who suggested that i would be better off shooting in raw rather than jpeg. his theory was that i could shoot with negative f settings to get faster shutter speeds. and then be able to edit back in the exposure with a raw editor. any one else do this. or just use raw?

I noticed that Bryan Peterson specifically mentioned this technique 2 or 3 times in his latest book, "Understanding Shutter Speed". In one example he mentioned shooting a kayaker (sp??) 2 full steps underexposed, and then using Adobe RAW to bring the exposure up, while maintaining the benefits of the slower shutter speed. In fact, I think he referred to it as "the anti-neutral density filter".

I'm just a noobie when it comes to shooting, but I would only use this technique in the worst case scenario. I certainly wouldn't do it if I had other options available.

Molnies wrote in post #5568543
1/60s at 400mm without IS... I'm hoping you were using a tripod or you're very steady in your hands.
And I must say that I don't see a reason to underexpose like that in such a situation.

The reason is to keep the shutter speed up because you don't have IS or a tripod and are shooting at 400mm plus you've reached the maximum ISO of your camera .

e-k