Bright harsh sunlight and the perception of superior lenses

The rather hot and fine weather recently has been causing me some consternation as I have been struggling to control exposure correctly in areas of harsh sunlight and deep shade.

Been wondering about the different metering modes on the K5, I have been mainly using spot metering alongside centre weighted autofocus. Been keeping ISO at 100 and am wodering if this best in conditions where large dynamic range is desirable?

I have been finding it harder to get decent results after using much better lenses than the kit lens. Is it due to my perception that these DA* lenses are just more unforgiving of poor technique and amateurish usage? Or I'm so used to the kit lens that the superior images I'm looking at (more natural, greater sharpness, colour) look wrong to me?

Since the baby I've hardly been out and when we do go out there simply isn't time to stand about and compose properly, have to take snapshots as and where I can.

The lower the ISO the more Dynamic range you can capture.

I wouldn't think a better lens would make it harder. Perhaps you just don't like very contrasty images?

Spot metering when there are mixed harsh shade and sunlight areas is always going to be a minefield. Centre weighted is generally safer I find.

My brain is mush. Yep low ISO is always best!

I always boost contrast in Lightroom. Maybe it's the monitor on this laptop that's a problem? Need to set up my big PC again.....

The camera's sensor cannot 'capture' the same levels of white and dark as the human eye can (be it by way of clever brain trickery or otherwise) and with high contrast scenes you are better exposing for the highlights (underexposing usually and using the histogram) then brightening the shadows afterwards, using HDR or by use graduated filters as all of these techniques can help

Personally I prefer using ND grads where possible other wise underexposure is my preferred option, however, there are plenty using the HDR approach.

Hope this helps.

Stu

You can't expect to use spot metering if you can't take some time. I'm pretty sure that could be the source of the problem. Switch to centre weighted and that should help.

To try out a utility called Rawdigger, I've just taken a whole ruck of photos of a white sheet of paper, starting at the exposure as metered and increasing by one third of a stop, all the way up to four stops overexposed. According to Rawdigger, no clipping took place in any RAW channel until the exposure reached +2.66 stops.

Spot metering the brightest highlights and opening up two stops is the strategy that I've used for quite a while for contrasty scenes - and, according to Rawdigger, it seems to still give about 0.66 stops headroom before any clipping takes place. If the highlights are some bright colour with no detail you need (or want) to record, then you might be able to push it even further than +2EV without detriment to the resulting image.

Andrew

Andrew

At Yeovilton Air day on Saturday I was constantly swapping between all 3 metering modes with varying degrees of success, I couldn't find one that constantly gave me decent successive shots. Add to that the heat haze and the fact my K-5II was locking onto that rather than the aircraft and the camera totally locked up on me (first time I have had that in years) and then when I tried a bit of video I got the overheating symbol .... I was amazed I got any decent pictures at all.

My mkii locked up a few times at this years glastonbury, every time it was hot and i didnt even consider that a factor until i just read your comment Mike...

The K30 has not been enjoying the good weather either. I took it too Exbury House and Gardens on Monday where it got rather hot and bothered. Started doing some rather bizarre things before locking up completely. First time its done that with the latest firmware. I don't blame it, i too was struggling to cope with the heat.

Plus despite the rather bright conditions it still managed some rather good (for me) photos. I used manual focus and spot metering metering on the highlights plus histogram.

It's digressing a bit, but I've been out and about with the K500 and K50 and they haven't so much as blinked in the heat yet.

Having said that, I tend to seek the shadows so we might be well suited...

I have used my original *istD and K20D in temperatures in the high 30's and low 40's many times and never had a problem. I just don't leave them in the passenger compartment of a car but locked in the boot with a cover over to stop heat from circulating air.

The boot of a car can get incredibly hot, so I never leave any equipment in. Apart from anything else, someone will be watching you and that kit could be gone when you return. I've known people who it's happened to.

To the OP Stuey has summed up the issue, it doesn't matter which metering mode you try if the light levels from dark to bright are outside of the cameras dynamic range, which at base iso 80 is a maximum of 14 stops...

whilst you're in spot metering check out the range you're trying to capture by metering the brightest part of the scene, usually just to the side of the sun (not directly at it !!) and noting the shutter speed, then spot meter the darkest part/shadow area and note the shutter speed.. then work out how many stops between them, more than 14 and it's HDR or NDgrads as Stuey mentions

Simon

It's possible to make it really hard isn't it?

A simple way for metering mixed bright sun and shade is to just use CW to get an averaged value, this will usually be a decent compromise provided you are actually metering from areas with a good mix of tones. Then after having taken that first shot and not missed it as a mental sanity check compare exposure to the sunny f16 rule - if your metered value is above the f16 rule and there are areas in full sun you are going to get blown highlights.