landscapes w/ people and blown skys

[stump4545]

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when shooting people in natural landscapes like forests etc, man the sky tends to blowout all the time and it is not recoverable in LR especially with the MM.

 

should one just accept that a good portion of sky will be blownout when shooting people in front of a sky and just expose for the person/main subject?

 

can't have everything i guess.

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[philipus]

When I shot digital, I used these suggestions by Harold Davis on occasion.

 

The problem with digital and highlights, however, is that if its blown there really isn't any information there. But there may be some depending on how "blown" it is. To speak techie speak.

[Jay B]

Meter for the sky and bring up the rich shadows to where you want...

All of the people were black with no visible detail in the original raw image.

 

 

[jaapv]

Taking care of proper exposure certainly helps... Otherwise it is take two exposures and Photoshop is your friend... Or use a fill flash, or HDR,or a gradient filter, etc....Technique is the answer.

[250swb]

Jay is right on the mark.

 

Expose more towards the highlights (but only just enough to get detail), and use ACR to bring up the shadows, you will be surprised at how much information is present. It is simple post processing and addresses the same problems photographers have always had in the darkroom, how to balance extremes of contrast. A Photoshop/Lightroom plugin like Silver Efex Pro used after the initial processing in ACR adds to the tools available and makes final refinements much easier, and you have that available free with your MM.

 

Steve

[stump4545]

thanks for all the suggestions.

 

the MM has so much shadow detail i will expose not to clip highlights and then bring up shadows in post.

 

is there any graduated filter systems for the M?

 

never really seen them in the wild.

 

thanks.

[tobey bilek]

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Grads never seem to work unless there is a flat horizon, unless you like two toned trees or buildings.

 

A person with his back to sun would give you same problem.

[IWC Doppel]

I meter the floor when outside then drop 2 stops to help the sky, I know I can pull two stops back, but unless I only want shadows I'd rather blow some of the sky

[Jeff S]

is there any graduated filter systems for the M?

 

There's the gradient tool in LR, and LR4 includes a wide array of local adjustments, including exposure, highlights, whites and color temp and tint. Converting from a color file will also allow use of color channels, which of course won't apply to the MM, although careful work in PS will provide alternatives. But, as mentioned, shadow recovery with the MM offers other advantages.

 

One must learn the tools, but in all cases the best approach is to start with proper exposure.

Anyone who has darkroom experience soon learns to provide the darkroom attendant with good negs....same approach applies to digital, especially regarding highlights where most of the data resides.

 

Jeff

[exile]

Options:

1) use off camera flash(es) or a reflector if your subject is localized.

2) use dodge and burn in post processing to darken the sky and lighten the people. I agree with others here that shadow detail is far more tolerant to manipulation than blown highlights. Remember to increase the saturation slightly when using the dodge tool on colour files, otherwise skin will appear ghostly.

3) use exposure bracketing or multiple development of a single RAW file and then combine using Layer masking.