great blue heron that wants to be an egret

[jann1033]

like i said on the other thread from the histogram it looks like it would be fine...( mountain like with edges barely if touching right or left) but even the leaves are blown on some of these...took 4 or 5 so i'd be sure to have one ... but wouldn't/shouldn't the histogram be way to the right then anyway?

there has to be an easier way to post this but the shutter is 1/60, aperture 5.6 evaluation metering, (dumb )+2/3 compensation, iso 200 auto white bal. parameters( any one know how to erase this, tried setting default and it didn't work) contast/sharp/ saturation all mid high color tone 0

all that stealthy stalking him and getting in the mud for nothing

 

[Kelly Grannell]

1. bring down to ISO 100
2. if anything, bring compensation DOWN not UP
3. if available (this I'm not sure) use SPOT metering

 

[Kelly Grannell]

here's a pic of the histogram. I circled the part that's cut off. That's the sign of 'clipping'

 

[Anewman]

like i said on the other thread from the histogram it looks like it would be fine...( mountain like with edges barely if touching right or left) but even the leaves are blown on some of these...took 4 or 5 so i'd be sure to have one ... but wouldn't/shouldn't the histogram be way to the right then anyway?

there has to be an easier way to post this but the shutter is 1/60, aperture 5.6 evaluation metering, (dumb )+2/3 compensation, iso 200 auto white bal. parameters( any one know how to erase this, tried setting default and it didn't work) contast/sharp/ saturation all mid high color tone 0

all that stealthy stalking him and getting in the mud for nothing

Well as with all "guidelines", there are exceptions.
When the subject is the brightest object in the frame you can not have anything touching the right(unless you want the subject blown). That is a case where you can expect lots of touching on the left(losing shadows).

But looking at the histogram, it is more than barely touching IMO.

 

[boBQuincy]

I respectfully submit that you should not lower your ISO. Your shutter speed is already 1/60 and any slower will only lead to blur. Your aperture is f/5.6 and anything wider gets you farther from the sweet spot of f/8.

The image is overexposed, and the main subject is overexposed by quite a bit. Compensation of +2/3 will almost always lead to overexposure. If you have a spot meter you could meter the heron and set him/her to a value of Zone V or VI. If you do not have a spot meter (more likely) you can move the compensation to -1/2 and bracket +/- 1, greatly improving your chances of getting a very good exposure.

The range of the image is difficult to capture in jpg, raw will give you at least 2 more stops of range and help a lot with this image.

 

[jann1033]

on the zoom browser where i was looking at the histogram for all the 5 shots, none of them look any thing like that...the right edge fades away either before or just slightly to the right of the edge, none of the clipping section and looks like a perfect equal sided mountain....but on the only other software( nero) i have that shows a histogram it does look more like the one you said...so does not all soft ware show histograms the same way? ( i tried copying and pasting the zoombrowser one but it won't work...) i don't remember the camera histogram being way off since i probably would have tried to adjust it if i had( however it was really bright and hard to see the screen so maybe i thought it looked better than it did )

i don't have spot metering , i do have center weighted average metering or partial metering, don't know if either of those would have help?

could you explain about the range that would make raw better? would it be due to the reflection of water on the bird plus the darker background? just trying to figure what might give the same type of reaction next time. (of course the easiest one is making sure it's not on +2( I must have hit something since the ones right before it are 0 then it's +2/3 for the rest of the day not that it doesn't boggle the mind how i looked in the view finder for another 2 hrs and never noticed what the exposure was but well, what can i say, evidently that little tidbit passed through my Swiss cheese of a brain)

and this one ( well basically most i took that day) was at the same settings and a big water body except the shutter is 1/640 and didn't get like that so evidently that was fast enough to knock back the over exposure?...the heron is actually a steel blue color( darker than the bricks on the bridge in this one) so i would think the water glare would have been the brightest part in the bird one but evidently that would be wrong although i notice even the weeds by the camera are over exposed...

anyway, thanks, maybe some day i'll get it right

 

[boBQuincy]

could you explain about the range that would make raw better?

Sure, the camera captures the image in 12 bits (4096 levels). Jpg processing (in the camera) fits the data to 8 bits (256 levels), tossing away the 4 bits the program decides it doesn't need. Raw keeps all the data until you decide what to do with the image.

Theoretically, raw has 16 times more information. Practically, it seems to come out to more like 4 times, or two stops. That's still a big improvement in range, often enough to make all the difference with an image like this one.
Raw also applies no white balance, allowing this to be done later, but to me the extra range is the biggest benefit.

The downside? Raw takes maybe 4 times as much memory and requires processing outside of the camera.
The best of both worlds: If you have plenty of memory cards you can set the camera to take a Jpg along with the Raw, then only process the ones you want to.

 

[JR6ooo4]

Since we do not have spot metering on the xt it is best to assume the whole scene is being metered. weighted metering helps some. The bird was much brighter than the rest of the scene. With raw you have a little more info to work with. And just like the selective coloring routine, you do that with exposure. to bring extremes of exposure back to an average. Select the bright parts and do your adjustments then select the darker leaves and such and do all your adjustments. Of course with layers and masks etc...

 

[0bli0]

use can use centre weighted plus the AE lock to get results similar to spot, and this will go a long way to getting your exposure useable. and use raw for the dynamic range. and i would definitely fix the +2/3 comp before shooting anything else.

 

[Kelly Grannell]

boB,

I recommended the ISO 100 because currently she's using ISO 200 PLUS +2/3 EV. If she's using ISO 100 with 0 EV, then she'll get 1/50 shutter speed, which is fine considering she's using IS.

 

[jann1033]

so in your opinions is the center weighted the best "all around" mode or just for pics with more contrast than
usual?

and with the ae i just point to the brightest part press 1/2 way and hit the ae button then i am set for the correct exposure for that although now i see ( according to the manual) it depends on what metering mode i have on as to where it locks.
probably the less i have to change with each picture the better( ) although i really need to "think" more and "take" less i've decided

i did change the +2/3