Panda_
enthusiast
Reged: 17/06/2008
Posts: 379
Loc: South Wales
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Having recently got the camera, I'm still quite new with the setup, and one thing I'm having problems is getting the right colours out of my photographs.
An example would be this shot.
Taken with spot metering and 'standard picture style', there wasn't too much sunlight there, which is why I was surprised it came out all blown like that.
Does anyone know the reason for this? I've tried other metering too, and just got a CPL filter which should help a little for future times!
What do you guys normally shoot in at the 'picture style' menu?
-P
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My Flickr account.
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Malcolm_Stewart
Carpal \'Tunnel
Reged: 11/07/2005
Posts: 2583
Loc: Milton Keynes, UK
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I see what you mean!
As you say it was taken with Spot Metering, it's near impossible to tell. Where did you point the spot? Your meter isn't intelligent, so it would have tried to make the fairly small spot area into a mid-tone, and the central area of your image is quite well exposed. I imagine that your histogram would have been way over to the right with the influence of the sunlit areas, and the highlights would probably have been blinking (unless you've turned them off) as a warning. (You have got the histogram turned on? It's one of the best features of a DSLR.)
With your choice of subject even with Evaluative metering in use, I would expect to dial in something like -2/3s or more to retain detail in your sunlit areas. (I'm assuming that you're using one of the P, Tv, or Av modes?) Don't worry about the shadows going too dark - you can lighten them later in an editing program.
Standard picture style is what I've used for >12,000 images on my 5D and it works well for me. HTH and better luck next time.
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Malcolm Stewart
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Wheelu
member
Reged: 31/10/2007
Posts: 168
Loc: UK, up North
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A spot meter is a very dangerous tool if you don't fully understand what it is reading and how to use the results. In order to use a spot reading directly you need to read from a neutral mid tone within the photo, or to take readings of shadow and highlight regions and decide what you wish to include/lose, by manually adjusting the exposure accordingly. Read Ansell Adams, "The Negative", or a similar book to learn how it should be done.
You would have got a much better exposure using Canon's evaluative metering system, but, as Malcolm has pointed out, even then there are some scenes that will fox the meter, and it always pays to take a look at the histogram and adjust as necessary.
I have an "old technology" 20D and it gets it right 80% of the time, the 40D will be at least as good, and probably better.
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My Flickr Photos
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Bettina
Kein Titel
Reged: 12/02/2004
Posts: 4104
Loc: London
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I've never used a picture style and I probably never will. "P" mode with evaluative metering should give you a good result in most cases. If the picture looks iffy then check the histogram. This will tell you if it's exposed okay.
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Bettina
http://www.vibrantpictures.co.uk
Vibrant Pictures on Flickr
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Simon_King
enthusiast
Reged: 17/11/2006
Posts: 242
Loc: South Wales
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Quote:
I've never used a picture style and I probably never will. "P" mode with evaluative metering should give you a good result in most cases. If the picture looks iffy then check the histogram. This will tell you if it's exposed okay.
Same here, I'd rather stick with the basics and tweak in photoshop if need be. I'd say that the spot used for the exposure was wrong. It may make sense to use manual and take a spot reading from a mid tone, set the exposure and then click.
Cheers
Simon
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My Gallery
An Englishman in Cwmbran, I like my toast done on one side!
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daft_biker
Action Man!
Reged: 11/10/2006
Posts: 7697
Loc: Doon the glen
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The large dark area of trees covering much of the frame, including the centre would fool all metering modes into overexposure (assuming the shot is uncropped and that's the scene the camera metered for).
I find that the 40D meter is easily fooled(but predictable!) and when shooting light or dark subjects you need to dial in some exposure compensation. A stop either way seems to cover most things but you do need consider the exposure and if light or dark areas will cause the meter to give you something other than your ideal exposure.
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Andrew (BSRIPN) ... Pics.
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Panda_
enthusiast
Reged: 17/06/2008
Posts: 379
Loc: South Wales
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Quote:
Where did you point the spot? Your meter isn't intelligent, so it would have tried to make the fairly small spot area into a mid-tone, and the central area of your image is quite well exposed. I imagine that your histogram would have been way over to the right with the influence of the sunlit areas, and the highlights would probably have been blinking (unless you've turned them off) as a warning. (You have got the histogram turned on? It's one of the best features of a DSLR.)
With your choice of subject even with Evaluative metering in use, I would expect to dial in something like -2/3s or more to retain detail in your sunlit areas. (I'm assuming that you're using one of the P, Tv, or Av modes?) Don't worry about the shadows going too dark - you can lighten them later in an editing program.
I took a reading from the trees in the background, and also tried the bushes to the left of them, so I'm not too sure. I think I'd need to read up on spot metering more then and try it at a later time :{
I've got the histogram enabled in the 'info' section, but wasn't really looking at it when taking this shot as it was more of a snap shot when out for a walk.
Here's the info I got from CS3:
Was shooting in Av at the time and once I open the sRAW in photoshop you can see a whole lot of red if you enable the 'highlight clipping warning' which I'm guessing is too bright yeah? 
Quote:
A spot meter is a very dangerous tool if you don't fully understand what it is reading and how to use the results. In order to use a spot reading directly you need to read from a neutral mid tone within the photo, or to take readings of shadow and highlight regions and decide what you wish to include/lose, by manually adjusting the exposure accordingly. Read Ansell Adams, "The Negative", or a similar book to learn how it should be done.
You would have got a much better exposure using Canon's evaluative metering system, but, as Malcolm has pointed out, even then there are some scenes that will fox the meter, and it always pays to take a look at the histogram and adjust as necessary.
I have an "old technology" 20D and it gets it right 80% of the time, the 40D will be at least as good, and probably better.
I'll keep those pointers in mind, and will check out the AA book you mentioned
Thanks all!
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My Flickr account.
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El Sid
Going potty
Reged: 14/04/2003
Posts: 9470
Loc: Sussex-by-the-Sea
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Looking at your picture it's clear the partial metering has taken the reading from the centre of the image and has been heavily influenced by the deep shadow those trees appear to have been in. The net result is that they have been rendered as mid tones and your highlights have blown.
The partial metering area (the 40D doesn't have a proper spot function) is indicated by a faint circle visible in the viewfinder and centred around the central AF point. In partial metering mode ALL the metering data is taken from the area covered by this circle. Unlike evaluative mode partial metering is not linked to the active AF point(s) and the reading is always taken from the area covered by the partial metering circle even if the active AF point is not the centre one.
With partial metering I find it's best used in manual mode. What I normally do with my 20D is to use the partial metering to determine the brightest part of the scene and then manually set this to between 1 and 2 stops over exposed. Generally white objects need to be set to about 2 stops over and things like blue sky or light grey (eg clouds) are better set to about 1-1½ stops. It takes a bit of practice to get a good feel for what settings are appropriate but I have found that I get far fewer issues with blown highlights since I adopted this way of working.
Looking at your example I reckon you would have been better to have metered from the foreground grass and set about 1½ stops over exposure. As there appear to be no really brighter areas such a setting would probably be enough to keep the grass and similar highlight areas within the dynamic range of the camera while maximising detail in the majority of the shadow area.
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Nigel
Completely BSRIPN 
ElSid Gallery
A camera in the hand is more fun than one in the cupboard........
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daft_biker
Action Man!
Reged: 11/10/2006
Posts: 7697
Loc: Doon the glen
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Quote:
Standard picture style is what I've used for >12,000 images on my 5D and it works well for me. HTH and better luck next time.
With flash I find standard a bit loud colour wise so I use faithful.....for approx 14,000 shots since April when I got the 40D 
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Andrew (BSRIPN) ... Pics.
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Simon_King
enthusiast
Reged: 17/11/2006
Posts: 242
Loc: South Wales
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Quote:
The partial metering area (the 40D doesn't have a proper spot function) is indicated by a faint circle visible in the viewfinder and centred around the central AF point.
Does this mean the spot metering mode in my 40D is bogus, there are four modes available:
- Evaluative;
- Partial;
- Spot;
- Centre Weighted Average;
Partial metering covers 9% of the area and spot covers 3.8% of the area.
Confused here.
Cheers
Simon
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My Gallery
An Englishman in Cwmbran, I like my toast done on one side!
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Benchista
Wich Tyler
Reged: 11/08/2000
Posts: 37887
Loc: Everywhere and nowhere, baby
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Quote:
Quote:
The partial metering area (the 40D doesn't have a proper spot function) is indicated by a faint circle visible in the viewfinder and centred around the central AF point.
Does this mean the spot metering mode in my 40D is bogus, there are four modes available:
- Evaluative;
- Partial;
- Spot;
- Centre Weighted Average;
Partial metering covers 9% of the area and spot covers 3.8% of the area.
Confused here.
Cheers
Simon
No, it means Nigel is mistaken - the 40D DOES have a spot meter. Cameras in the xxD range before it didn't. Of course 3.8 degrees is still fairly wide for a true spotemeter (1 or 2 would be more like it).
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Nick
www.nbrphoto.com
Light and Shade II - the new blog
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El Sid
Going potty
Reged: 14/04/2003
Posts: 9470
Loc: Sussex-by-the-Sea
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Quote:
No, it means Nigel is mistaken...
Technically it means that Canon's own Camera Museum is mistaken, all I did was check in the wrong place... 
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Nigel
Completely BSRIPN
ElSid Gallery
A camera in the hand is more fun than one in the cupboard........
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Simon_King
enthusiast
Reged: 17/11/2006
Posts: 242
Loc: South Wales
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Quote:
Quote:
No, it means Nigel is mistaken...
Technically it means that Canon's own Camera Museum is mistaken, all I did was check in the wrong place...
That's poor, but the the web site looks a bit weak too! Still glad that I'm not going mad.
Cheers
Simon
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My Gallery
An Englishman in Cwmbran, I like my toast done on one side!
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john_g
Pooh-bah Hoo-ha
Reged: 09/05/2007
Posts: 2536
Loc: Surrey
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The spot meter is a very specialised tool and, yes, the place to go to learn about it is the Ansel Adams series of books. To get an easier-to-digest introduction, have a look here:
http://www.trustedreviews.com/digital-ca...pot-Metering/p1
Basically, the spot meter is intended to allow the photographer to measure the comparative brightness of various areas in the frame. It is based on the idea of an 18% reflectance grey card and will set the exposure assuming that the photographer is metering off a subject that equates to this. But this is only the beginning. What should always follow is to take more spot readings off the bright and dark areas of the frame to find out where they will fall in the grey scale and, most importantly, whether the film/sensor will be able to record them with any tonal accuracy - in other words, will the highlights and shadows still contain detail or will they be burnt out?
I used to use spot metering most of the time when I used film and would take, as an absolute minimum, three spot meter readings before deciding what exposure to use. But, now I've gone digital, I can't remember using spot metering. Use evaluative or average or centre-weighted and then look at the histogram to make sure that the picture is correctly exposed.
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John
Who could suppose that angels move the stars, or be so superstitious as to suppose that because one cannot see one's soul at the end of a microscope, it does not exist?
R.D.Laing The Politics Of Experience
http://www.flickr.com/photos/john_gass
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Muffin
enthusiast
Reged: 14/09/2006
Posts: 386
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I always shoot in RAW with my 30D and the histogram facility has never been used! I am not used to cameras with such things. I vaguely understand what the histogram can do but if you only shoot in RAW is it useful?
The 30D instruction book is not good and I couldn't fathom how to get the histogram but I discovered that I had to press the 'info' button twice. Is it possible to view a histogram before taking the shot? If that was possible then adjustments could be made before the shot was taken but as things stand it would seem that you may need to look at several pix to get the right histogram. Hmmmm.
Anyone got any help?
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My Flickr
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daft_biker
Action Man!
Reged: 11/10/2006
Posts: 7697
Loc: Doon the glen
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Yes, I find the histogram useful when using RAW....but then I find it every bit as useful when shooting JPEG so I don't think it matters what file format you save in.
Dunno if you get a histogram before the shot if using liveview but not to worry...if you've got time to check the histogram before a shot you've got time to take a test shot  I find a live histogram more useful on a compact as it can take several seconds to take a test shot and check the exposure.
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Andrew (BSRIPN) ... Pics.
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john_g
Pooh-bah Hoo-ha
Reged: 09/05/2007
Posts: 2536
Loc: Surrey
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The histogram is your sensor's way of telling you what it's seen. It's far and away the best way of knowing whether you've got burnt-out highlights and blocked-in shadows. I check it after taking a picture - my camera is set up to show it over the preview. If there's a problem, I can instantly dial in some exposure compensation and, hopefully, take another shot.
Have a look here:
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/understanding-series/understanding-histograms.shtml
p.s. When I started using digital, I didn't understand histograms either. But I'm glad I took the time to get to grips with them - badly exposed images are now, by and large, a thing of the past.
Edited by john_g (07/10/2008 22:33)
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Muffin
enthusiast
Reged: 14/09/2006
Posts: 386
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You are both most kind and the advice was very helpful. I must grapple with histograms because with a digital camera it doesn't matter much how many shots you take and it would pay to take a few pix and check the histogram. There will be circumstances where that can't be done and I suppose one just has to hope that the camera can cope and the RAW image can be adjusted.
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My Flickr
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Muffin
enthusiast
Reged: 14/09/2006
Posts: 386
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John - can I set my 30D to show the histogram over the preview?
Aaaaagh! I think I may just have discovered how to do it. I get a small preview and then a histogram side by side but the preview is very small. Might one have to switch from this mode to full preview? Presumably if the histogram is satisfactory then one could do that?
Aaaagh!!! I have just discovered that it is possible to switch between the small preview plus histogram to a large preview very quickly and easily just by pressing the info button! You are writing to an idiot.
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My Flickr
Edited by Muffin (07/10/2008 23:04)
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AGW
Reged: 03/10/2003
Posts: 7737
Loc: Ayrshire
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I'm sure we had a discussion here not too many months ago where it was concluded that the histogram is based on a jpeg and does not really reflect the exact range of the raw image.....but I dont suppose it is likley to be so different to make much practical practical difference.
Graeme
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AGW (BSRIPN)
Blessed are they who see beautiful things in humble places where others see nothing. (Camille Pissarro)
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