I See a Red Door and I Want to Paint It Black [Encore Publication]: When a black-and-white image is better than color, and how to convert to B&W

Back in the day, a photographer had to choose in advance whether to shoot with color film or black-and-white film. Conversions from color to B&W were cumbersome and expensive, and conversions from B&W to color were essentially impossible. During the film era, I typically shot exclusively using color transparency film while traveling, and reserved B&W photography for particularly artistic shoots near home.

Thankfully, in today’s digital world, we no longer have to commit ourselves in advance to monochrome vs. color images. It’s now a simple procedure to convert our color images to B&W during post-processing. And that’s a great blessing, because there are plenty of times when a black-and-white photo is better than a color photo.

Consider the image of the alligator at the start of this post. One of my favorite photos, this one works just fine in color, too. But the real power of the image is revealed in B&W through the striking textures of the alligator’s skin as seen above the water and as reflected off the water’s surface. The background above the water fades to a deep, nearly true, black, with the background of the water itself rendered slightly less darkly and showing some nice ripples of motion. Black-and-white photography is especially powerful when there are contrasts of pattern, texture, and background as in this image. Buy this photo

When else might we want to render an image in B&W?

Portraits made in monochrome have a timeless look that evokes the earlier years of photography, and this rendering can also bring out the true nature of the subject. There’s a lovely look to the skin tones and hair when displayed in B&W, and there are fewer distracting elements from the color of clothing or background objects.

This portrait takes on a vintage, timeless look when shown in B&W. Our eye can focus on the model’s face and hair without the distractions of the colors in her sweater or the building. There’s almost a street photography kind of documentary quality to this image in monochrome that is lost when viewed in color. Buy this photo

Color can be distracting in an image where we want to emphasize the essence of a person or place. In this portrait I made recently for a couple who are fellow musicians and friends of mine, we had beautiful “golden hour” light to work with, and the background and clothing worked well in color. But converted to B&W, this image really places the emphasis on the couple without the distractions of the color cast in the reflections off the eyeglasses or of the mixed lighting in the background.

In this portrait, black-and-white presentation places the viewer’s attention squarely on the the couple and their instruments, without distractions from the multiple colors of the clothing and background components. (Client photo not available for purchase.)

When you’re shooting under “mixed lighting”, which means there are multiple light sources with different color temperatures (i.e., some light sources are warmer and others are cooler), converting the image to B&W can be a real problem solver. Consider the image below, made in Bruges at night. The light from the street lamps was warmer than the light coming from the spotlights on various buildings, and there was also a bright moon that night, so when seen in color the photo would look less appealing due to the contrasting of the color temperatures in the different parts of the image. But viewed in B&W, it brings out the grandeur of the old buildings and the beauty of the reflections in the waters of the canal, without the distractions of the color casts.

This image of Bruges at night, when processed in B&W, removes the contrasting color temperatures of the multiple different light sources and allows the viewer to enjoy the stately old buildings with consistent tone and texture. Buy this photo

Now that we’ve covered a few of the many situations in which a black-and-white image is preferable over a color image, let’s look at how to convert from color to B&W. There are many ways to perform this conversion, but I recommend it be done using the Color Adjustments settings in the Develop module of Adobe Lightroom. Here’s how:

Click on the “B&W” tab above the individual color channel sliders, and then adjust the mix of how the colors are blended by increasing or decreasing each color’s slider to see how the black-and-white image looks. I find that I often have to readjust the contrast slider at this point to get the image looking its best in black-and-white.

For more on using Lightroom to post-process your images, check out my previous post: Previous post on using Lightroom to post-process images.

I do not recommend using your camera’s built-in black-and-white mode, as you will then lose the color information in the image file. I also do not suggest using the settings some cameras have to make a copy of the image in B&W, because in most cases the camera’s built-in software will not do a very good job of rendering the image in monochrome. For the best results, either use Lightroom or a dedicated black-and-white conversion application such as Silver Efex Pro 2 from Nik Software, which is available as a plug-in for Lightroom or Photoshop.

Want to read other posts about travel photography techniques? Find them all here: http://www.to-travel-hopefully.com/category/techniques/

What do you love about a black-and-white image? When do you convert an image to B&W rather than share it in color? Any tips or tricks for how to make great B&W photos? Please share your thoughts in the comment box!

Capturing the Creative Process [Encore Publication]: How to document an artist’s work using your own artistic vision

Capturing images of the performing arts is a specialty of mine, as well as one of my absolute favorite genres of photography. But as gratifying as I find documenting live performances of dance, music, or theater, there’s a whole higher level of photographic joy available from capturing the artist’s creative process before their work reaches a public audience. Today’s post focuses on a recent behind-the-scenes shoot that I did for a friend and longtime collaborator, Arina Hunter.

I arranged to shoot her dress rehearsal just before the first of two public performances as part of San Francisco’s SAFEhouse for the Arts RAW (Resident Artist Workshop) program. Arina was preparing to perform an untitled work-in-progress which was quite complicated technically, so it was fascinating to watch her process of making artistic decisions and readying herself and the technical crew for the evening’s show.

Read on to see some of my favorite images from the rehearsal, accompanied by a few thoughts about my own artistic and technical process that went into the capture of Arina’s work.

All of these images are available for sale on my website. Just click on any image to view them in the online gallery.

The creative process is about more than just practicing for a performance. Try to include some wider views depicting the artist’s full environment including equipment, sets, and performance space.

The flip side is that it’s also important to get up-close and to capture the physical work that goes into preparing for a performance.

Shoot plenty of frames to maximize the chances of capturing the “decisive moment” when the artist’s work comes together as an integrated whole.

Typically there are several different moods evoked in a single piece of art. This image captures a vulnerability and poignancy that informed Arina’s work even as much of her physical performance exudes strength. Finding the right perspective to convey each mood is key to making successful images.

When post-processing my images, I ask myself how can my own technique best convey the artist’s intention. For this image I decided a monochrome conversion would best render Arina’s physicality at this precise moment during her process. Freeing the viewer from the anchor of color perception, a black-and-white image is graphic and timeless and allows us to focus on what is elemental: form, contrast, shadow, and light.

I shot this image from a low perspective near the ground so as to juxtapose Arina’s body with the projected video image on the wall. Always look for a different perspectives while shooting that can create compositions to get across your intent.

Another example of perspective: To make this image I climbed on top of a chair and shot down on Arina in her performance space.

Sometimes the details convey the story better than the whole. This closeup of Arina’s paint-covered hand framed by colorful canvas makes a powerful summary of her performance piece.

Today’s post has been a bit more conceptual and less technical than most of my posts. The purpose is to get you thinking about how our own art of photography can be harnessed to capture the creative process of other artists. The next time you are privileged to get to shoot an artist at work, think about how you can apply elements such as composition, perspective, color, texture, empty space, motion, and stasis to capture compelling images of the artist’s own vision!

Do you have techniques you’ve used to document other artists’ creative process? Please share your thoughts here.

Want to read other posts about photographic techniques? Find them all here: Posts about techniques.

Focus on ODC Interspaceology Dance Pilot [Encore Publication]: Capturing the new work of six inspiring choreographers

This past weekend I had the privilege of capturing the new work of six inspiring San Francisco Bay Area choreographers as the official photographer for ODC’s 69th dance pilot program. Because the six pieces differed substantially in their style, content, dance technique, lighting, and staging, this dress rehearsal shoot makes a good case study in live performance capture techniques. In today’s post I share some favorite images of each of the pieces along with some brief notes about how they were made.

“Ofrenda” by Carmen Roman:

Performing arts photography need not always show the performers. Sometimes it adds depth to a performance capture to include some images of costumes, props, venue, or lighting without the performers. This image shows the altar-like centerpiece, including the Peruvian folkloric masks, before the dancers entered.

This piece was performed outdoors on the street in front of the theater. It was natural to use some street photography techniques, such as waiting for the people to interact with the setting in an interesting way.

Because it was held in near-darkness, I had to use some flash to capture the piece. In these situations, I use an off-camera speedlight, handheld, and attached to the camera with a flash cord. I nearly always dial down the flash output by one stop so the lighting appears more natural.

“work/force” by Katelyn Hanes:

Try to capture moments when dramatic tension peaks. In this image, the viewer can feel the conflicting pull that is central to the piece. Using a fast shutter speed is essential with fast-moving performances, and since lighting is usually dim and available light must be used with no supplemental lighting, it is helpful to use a fast prime lens at a wide aperture and a high ISO setting on the camera.

In post-processing, I look for aspect ratios that best tell the story for each image. Sometimes that means changing from a landscape to a portrait orientation or vice-versa, and/or cropping to a non-standard aspect ratio.

“Engineering Ephemeral” by Alexandre Munz:

There can be drama in stillness as well as in motion. This emotional piece had some contemplative moments that tell the story as well as the more active portions.

Dance is about gesture and facial expression, too. This image captures the choreographer/dancer in a reflection of emotional pain, which to me speaks to a strong storyline.

“Interbeings” by Carly Lave:

This piece treated the interaction between a human and an artificial intelligence, so I wanted to document their initial encounter. The dramatic lighting of a single spotlight splits the frame into portions of light and shadow. To capture the image I had in my mind, I had to move to the center of the stage (made possible because this was a dress rehearsal, not a live performance with an audience) and to lie down on the floor to get a low shooting angle.

Most of the time, performing arts images should be tack-sharp, but for artistic effect it is sometimes desirable to give a sense of the motion by blurring the performer using a slow shutter speed. To make this image, I switched to a slower ISO setting and a narrower aperture in order to obtain a very slow shutter speed (1.6 seconds). Because it was shot handheld, I had to hold the camera very steady so as not to blur the background too much.

“Confab” by Arina Hunter:

I’ve worked with Arina several times before and so I have a good feeling for her style. To capture her new piece, I knew I’d need to have two camera bodies at the ready, one with a 50mm lens and the other with an 85mm lens, so that I could switch between expressive close-ups and exciting action shots. This image hightens the drama by combining a moment of tension with beautiful lighting and a clean black background.

The best technique for capturing exciting, fast-moving performances is to shoot plenty of images. I shot a series of images in rapid succession to catch this perfect moment in one of them. A very fast shutter speed is required, so I used a high ISO setting and a fast prime lens at a wide aperture.

Arina’s gestures and facial expressions are varied and compelling. To obtain this personal perspective, I shot from her level flat on the floor, and to ensure sharp focus on her whole body I used a moderate aperture setting (f/2.8), requiring a very high ISO setting (6400).

“ReeLs” by Dana Genshaft:

It can be a challenge to capture multiple dancers moving rapidly in a small space. Rather than always compose so that the performers are all lined up in a single row like a picket fence, I like to compose images where they are layered. This image creates a sense of the tension between the dancers by showing the foreground dancer in fast motion, slightly blurred, offset against the background dancers in an instant of stasis.

This image is composed with the dancers all in a row, but the composition works well because the lines of the performers’ bodies leads the viewer’s eye from one side of the frame to the other.

So, there you have it. It was a true joy documenting this ODC dance pilot program and getting to know the talented choreographers and dancers. I’ve described a number of different techniques that can be used, among others, to capture images as vibrant and varied as the performers themselves.

Now it’s your turn. Please share your favorite techniques for capturing live performances at home or while traveling.

Remember that you can see any of these images in a larger size on my website by clicking on them and that they all are available for purchase there.

Want to read more posts about photographic techniques? Find them all here: Posts about techniques.

Please Join Me for a Photo Walk/Workshop in SF’s Mission District: Learn travel photography techniques to capture a sense of place

Dear Readers,

August 16 is the only guaranteed remaining date for my highly rated photo walk/workshop in San Francisco’s Mission District. If you live in or will be visiting the SF Bay Area, please join me for this informative hands-on workshop. This experience is suitable for photographers of any level from beginner through professional. We will learn travel photography techniques that cover many photographic genres and can be applied to any location you visit to capture a strong sense of place. I’m partnering with Airbnb Experiences to offer this series of special photo workshops. More details can be found here: https://www.airbnb.com/experiences/227047.

Photo Workshop: SF’s Mission District

Arts experience

Hosted by Kyle

3 hours total

Drinks

Offered in English

About your host, Kyle

What we’ll do

What I’ll provide

One coffee drink up to $5 ?

Who can come

Guests ages 12 and up can attend.

Notes

Guests should be prepared to walk about 3 miles, including some hills. Bring your gear (any kind of camera or phone) with a fully charged battery and memory card with room to spare for your photos.

Where we’ll be

We’ll visit and photograph these Mission District locations: – Misión San Francisco de Asís (Mission Dolores) – Clarion Alley Murals – The Women’s Building – Dolores Park We stop along the way at a local cafe for a coffee drink and photo review (and restrooms).

Where we’ll meet

Misión San Francisco de Asís (Mission Dolores) · Mission District, San Francisco

Upcoming availability

Thu, Aug 16

3:00 PM − 6:00 PM · $79 per person

Reviews

Holden

July 5, 2018

We got a tour thru the Mission that I had never seen before. Kyle is a great communicator, and knows his stuff. I am a better photographer with a better eye than I was before I met Kyle!

Anne Sofie

July 5, 2018

Had a wonderful time with Kyle on the photowalk. We where a small group and Kyle inquired before the walk about our photograp…

悦Yue

May 18, 2018

Kyle is awesome ,if you just have just one chance to join one Airbnb Experience in San Francisco, choose his.We had a lot of …

Group size

There are 8 spots available on this experience.

You don’t have to fill all of them. Experiences are meant to be social, so other travelers could join too.

Guest requirements

Bringing guests under 18

If you bring a guest that’s under 18, it’s your responsibility to make sure the activities they participate in are age-appropriate.

From the host

Guests should be able to comfortably walk about 3 miles including some hills.

Who can come

Guests ages 12 and up can attend.

Experiences cancellation policy

Any experience can be canceled and fully refunded within 24 hours of purchase. See cancellation policy.

Capturing Authentic Portraits while Traveling: Join me for a free webinar this Saturday

Dear Readers,

In the first in a series of free webinars on various travel photography topics, I will share my tips and tricks on How to Capture Authentic Portraits while Traveling. This was the most often requested topic in my recent poll. Please register soon for this free Meetup event, as there are only 100 spaces available. A few days before the event, I will send out the link to registered participants.

Topics I will cover include:
* Planning your trip
* Gear
* Techniques
* Previsualization
* Approaching your subject
* Post-processing
* Think differently!

Please join my Travel Photography Workshops meetup group first (which also is free) and then RSVP for the webinar. Here’s the link: Travel Portrait Photography webinar.

Looking forward to having you join me for this webinar on a topic near and dear to my heart!

– Kyle

Meteoric Rise [Encore Publication]: How to shoot the Perseid and other meteor showers

Note: My favorite meteor shower of the year, the Perseid, is coming soon! Only the Geminid shower can approach the Perseid in terms of the expected peak rate of meteors, but the Geminids come in December where the weather can be more challenging, so at least in places like the San Francisco Bay Area, where clear weather reigns in the summer, the Perseid wins hands-down. Making matters even better, this year the night of peak activity of the Perseid Meteor Shower, August 12/13, comes just one day after a new moon, meaning the sky will be dark and the photography superb. For those of us who love to shoot shooting stars, the event later this month could be epic. Read on for more info about how to capture images of meteor showers.

While the Geminid Meteor Shower in December and the Perseid Meteor Shower in August are the best-known, each year there are quite a few major meteor showers that afford great opportunities for seeing meteor activity. Here is a partial list, courtesy of Sky & Telescope:

Major Meteor Showers in 2018
Shower	Radiant and direction	Morning of maximum	Best hourly rate	Parent
Quadrantid*	Draco (NE)	Jan. 4	60-100	2003 EH₁
Lyrid	Lyra (E)	April 22	10-20	Thatcher (1861 I)
Eta Aquariid*	Aquarius (E)	May 6	20-60	1P/Halley
Delta Aquariid*	Aquarius (S)	July 29	20	96P/Machholz
Perseid	Perseus (NE)	Aug. 13	90	109P/Swift-Tuttle
Orionid*	Orion (SE)	Oct. 21	10-20	1P/Halley
Southern Taurid	Taurus (S)	Nov. 5	10-20	2P/Encke
Leonid*	Leo (E)	Nov. 18	10-20	55P/Tempel-Tuttle
Geminid	Gemini (S)	Dec. 14	100-120	3200 Phaethon
Ursid*	Ursa Minor (N)	Dec. 22	10	8P/Tuttle

* Strong moonlight will interfere with these showers.

Source: Sky & Telescope

While it’s still technically tricky to make great images of a meteor shower, today’s technology certainly makes it possible for those of us without astronomical budgets to do so. I shot some nice images of last summer’s Perseid shower and would have been out there shooting the Geminids last December except that the cloud cover here in the San Francisco Bay Area was 95-100%. Here’s a composite of several images I shot last August of the Perseids.

A composite image made up of one long exposure for the lake, mountain, and trees, plus several 25-second exposures capturing the individual meteors I observed over a 2-hour period. Buy this photo

Most of the techniques you need for capturing a meteor shower are the same as for capturing the Milky Way. Review my post from a few weeks ago for a refresher course: Post on Milky Way Photography.

The special challenge when shooting a meteor shower is that meteors can occur anywhere in the sky. Even with a very wide-angle lens, such as a 14mm or 16mm lens on a full-frame camera, only a small portion of the sky can be covered. As we are limited to a maximum exposure time of about 25-30 seconds with a 14mm or 16mm lens so as to avoid blurring the stars into star trails, it’s clear that we have to shoot a lot of consecutive images to be likely to capture several meteors throughout the night. We then use software such as Photoshop to combine the images in which meteors are visible into a single composite image showing all of the meteor activity we captured during the night.

A good tutorial on shooting meteor showers, illustrated with amazing images by Glenn Randall, can be found here: Glenn Randall post on photographing meteor showers.

Have you photographed a meteor shower? What techniques did you use? Please share your experiences here.

Want to read more posts about photographic techniques? Find them all here: Posts on Techniques.

Focus on How Weird Street Faire: A case study on simple techniques to capture winning images of festivals

As a professional travel photographer, I shoot regularly in nearly all genres of photography. A typical day on the road might include shooting landscapes, wildlife, cityscapes, portraits, action (sports, dance, performance), and nighttime photography. While I enjoy all types of shooting, my great joy as a photographer is capturing portraits of the people I meet. Whether close to home or halfway around the world, getting to know the people and learning about their culture through making portraits of them is a wonderful experience. And there’s no better way to capture images of many amazing people in a short time than by attending local festivals. People tend to be their best selves at special celebrations like festivals and street fairs. They dress exuberantly, dance with abandon, make new friends quickly, and (nearly always) are overjoyed to pose for photos.

I shoot about a hundred festivals and other special events every year, so I’ve learned a few tips about how to make the best images during these occasions. In today’s post I share some simple but effective techniques for capturing great portraits at festivals and other gatherings, using San Francisco’s recent How Weird Street Faire as a case study. How Weird is a vibrant and colorful, only-in-SF, annual celebration of individuality, tolerance, music, art, and hula hoops. Read on to see some of my favorite images from this year’s festival, presented along with some discussion of how they were made. To view more of my images, or to buy some, check out this gallery: How Weird photo gallery.

I see a lot of fellow photographers at events like How Weird shooting with huge telephotos and even tripods, like they’re after images of wildlife on a Kenyan safari. In my opinion, they are missing the point. We’re making portraits of people here, so use a normal or moderate telephoto portrait lens, preferably a fast prime lens, ditch the tripod and monopod at home, and get in close to chat with and get to know the people you’re photographing. When you interact with people, you get a sense of what makes them special, allowing both you and them to capture that special trait in your photos. Random sniping from far away with a long telephoto will yield far more bland and generic photos. All of my images at How Weird Street Faire were made with a single camera body and one lens, my trusty 85mm f/1.8 portrait lens. Sometimes simple is better, especially when it comes to capturing people at fast-moving events.

Larger groups can be challenging to capture in portraits, particularly in bustling spaces like those of a festival. When they couple I was chatting with suddenly ran into a friend and they had a group hug, I quickly stepped back a few paces and made this expressive and engaging portrait. It’s okay to break the rules sometimes–here, one of the subject’s faces is completely obscured and another’s is partially obscured, yet the portrait works because it captures the energy and affection of the moment.

When photographers argue that the “street photography” approach (candidly sneaking images of people who aren’t aware they’re present) is the best for capturing people’s true essence, I show them images like this one. This wholly genuine and unguarded moment of the girl dancing was made with her full knowledge and permission. The trick is to chat with the subject and get their permission for photography first, then to lay back for a while and let them go back to what they were doing. After a few minutes, they’ll nearly forget you’re there and they will reveal their true selves. But unlike shots you sneak without permission, now you have a subject happy to have you photographing them, and you can take your time and not have to rush your work in order to hide your shooting from them.

Often we see only the most obvious subjects at crowded, chaotic events like festivals. It’s easy to spend all our time shooting people dancing, partying, and displaying their costumes, but I try always to look for the more hidden people and infrastructure that support the event. This DJ was partially hidden atop the big dance stage and behind the banks of speakers, but she made a fun subject for this portrait.

Don’t be afraid to get in close. This portrait really pops because the tight composition allows us to focus our attention on the symmetry and color of the subject’s hair and costume.

The interactions between people are at least as much fun to observe and capture as the individuals themselves. I had chatted with and photographed a group of people for a few minutes when I observed this fun interaction, so I stepped back and framed some shots of the two young people together.

While post-processing my images after the shoot, I decided to render this one in monochrome to achieve a gritty urban street scene sort of feel. Often color can distract from the power of an image, so always consider which of your images could benefit from conversion to black-and-white.

In ordinary daily life, I find that perhaps two-thirds of people are willing to have their portrait made if the photographer spends some time getting to know them first and then asks politely. But at a festival, nearly everyone is excited about posing for portraits. The trick is to capture scenes where they show you their underlying personalities a bit, rather than just striking a cliched pose for the camera. To achieve that here, I spent a few minutes shooting, asking the couple to pose in different styles and have fun with it.

Putting it all together. Here’s a summary of the basic techniques I use when shooting portraits at festivals: 1) Use a fast prime normal or portrait lens. 2) Set your camera for a fast shutter speed (1/500 second or faster is good for dancing and other fast action), wide aperture (f/2.5 or wider is ideal except for large groups) to isolate the subject, and an ISO appropriate to the lighting of the scene (I used ISO 100 the whole day due to the bright outdoor light). 3) Get to know your subject before shooting, let them relax, and capture them during an authentic moment. 4) Try to compose the portrait with as uncluttered a background as possible; of course, this is often difficult at crowded festivals. 5) During post-processing, crop to clean up the scene and then vignette just a touch to further clean up busy backgrounds.

I hope this discussion of techniques to capture portraits during festivals has been helpful. The best way to learn these techniques and to find your own style is to shoot and shoot some more!

Please leave a comment with your own thoughts and tips about how to make great images of people at celebrations.

Want to read more posts about photographic techniques? Find them all here: Posts about techniques.

Decent Exposure [Encore Publication]: Mastering exposure is key to getting great images

Of all the primary elements a photographer controls–composition, focus, the moment the shutter is released, and of course the choice of the subject–none is more critical to making a great image than setting a proper exposure. Some corrections to a poorly exposed image can be made in post-processing, and there are occasionally good artistic reasons to override the norms of exposure in order to evoke a certain mood in an image by making it darker or brighter than usual, but before we can effectively make these exceptional choices it is necessary to learn the basics of setting an appropriate exposure.

Let’s begin by defining exposure and the elements that comprise it. Simply put, exposure refers to the amount of light that reaches the camera’s sensor and therefore how light or dark the resulting image will appear. Four components together determine the exposure: 1) the brightness of the light reflecting off the subject and reaching the front of the lens, 2) the aperture setting on the lens (how wide or narrow is the opening of the lens), 3) the shutter speed setting (how long is the camera’s shutter open to allow light to strike the sensor), and 4) the sensitivity setting of the camera’s sensor. We don’t always have control over the first component, but the other three are within our control using our camera’s settings.

Many photographers simply set their camera on Auto mode and let the camera’s built-in meter make its best guess as to how the image should be exposed. That method can work well under certain conditions, but it is highly prone to errors. For example, if your main subject is strongly backlit, the camera’s meter will expose for the average brightness in the scene and will underexpose the subject. This is why so often we see underexposed photos of people standing outside in bright sunlight.

Although I compensated for the strong backlighting in this image of a Tibetan family enjoying a midday picnic, their faces are still quite shadowy, indicating a bit brighter exposure would have been better still. Buy this photo

Fortunately, there are several easy methods to achieve a correct exposure even under challenging lighting conditions. Here are a few that I use frequently:

Set the camera’s metering mode to Spot Metering: By default most cameras’ metering systems use a sophisticated pattern-matching algorithm that measures how bright or dark each area of the image is and makes its best guess about a workable exposure based on similar scenes in the camera’s database. Most cameras allow you to select a simpler metering mode called Spot Metering, that just measures the light at the central point in the image or another point that you select. If you choose Spot Metering and select the measuring point to be right where your main subject is, you should get just the right exposure.
Dial in some exposure compensation: Most cameras let you override the meter’s exposure setting by dialing in a compensation setting to lighten or darken the image. If your subject is backlit, you will likely want to increase the exposure by one to two stops (each “stop” of additional exposure represents a doubling of the amount of light reaching the sensor). The camera’s display should show something like “+1 EV” to alert you that you’ve dialed in 1 extra stop of exposure, and the number changes as you change the compensation setting. Just be sure to set the exposure compensation back to zero when you’re done using it.
Go fully manual: To gain complete control over your camera’s exposure settings, choose the meter’s Manual mode. Then you can change all three exposure elements (shutter speed, aperture, and ISO) until the image appears properly exposed when you review it on your camera’s display.
Use flash to increase the lighting on your main subject: One good way to achieve proper exposure with a backlit subject is to increase lighting on the subject itself, so that there is no longer such a difference in brightness between the subject and the background. Your camera’s built-in flash may be strong enough to pull off this trick, but it often helps to have a more powerful flash unit with you. There are some other reasons why you may not want to use flash as a main source of light on your subject, so this method should be used sparingly. A reflector can be used instead of flash to reflect some of the sun’s light onto the front of your subject.

For this photo shoot with a musician friend, I shot into the light so she wouldn’t have to squint into the sun and also so that we’d have a beautiful rim light from the sun around her hair. To pull this off, I used manual mode and selected the proper exposure for her face. I employed a reflector to bounce some sunlight back onto her face and trumpet. [Client image not for sale.]

Similar methods can be used for other challenging lighting conditions besides backlighting. If the subject is a brighter or darker color than the “neutral gray” your camera’s meter uses for a standard, then you need to dial in more or less exposure as appropriate. My black cat Dragonfly, for example, requires an especially dark exposure to override the meter from thinking he’s a gray cat and choosing too bright an exposure. Similarly, a white polar bear will need additional exposure to stop the meter from underexposing what it assumes to be a gray bear.

When photographing a black subject, reduce the exposure to compensate for the light meter’s mistaken assumption that the subject is a neutral gray color. Buy this photo

Whatever method you use to choose your exposure, be sure to take a look at the resulting image using your camera’s monitor. Does the main subject appear to be properly exposed, or is it still too dark or perhaps too bright? If your camera offers a histogram display, learn how it works and use it to check your exposure in tricky lighting conditions. I’ll write a future post specifically about the histogram, as it is a very useful and often overlooked feature.

With some attention to the exposure of your images and use of some of the techniques described here, you can achieve a correctly exposed image nearly all of the time. After mastering the essentials of exposure, you will have more keepers and fewer images in the virtual trash can, and you can even begin to break the rules for artistic effect.

Want to see more posts on photographic techniques? You can find them all here: Posts on Techniques.

What lighting situations do you find the trickiest? What techniques do you use to ensure properly exposed images? Please share your thoughts in the comments box.

Bracketing: Hedging Your Bets [Encore Publication]: In challenging shooting conditions, exposure bracketing is a great insurance policy

In the old film days of photography, it would be days or even weeks after shooting before we could see the results. I would routinely use a procedure called “bracketing” to make a series of shots, each at a slightly different exposure, to increase the odds that one would come out decently exposed. Even today, when digital photography allows us to see the results immediately, there are two good reasons to employ the exposure bracketing technique: 1) it can be hard to assess on a small LCD screen in bright daylight and while in the excitement of shooting whether the exposure is really correct, and 2) when the contrast between the brighter and dimmer parts of the scene is high we may want to stitch several different exposures together using software to create a high dynamic range (HDR) image later.

Tricky subjects, like this tiny Svalbard reindeer against a glacier background, benefit greatly from exposure bracketing. From a series of 5, 7, or even 9 images shot at slightly different exposures, you can choose the one with the correct exposure for the conditions. Buy this photo

So there are still good reasons to use exposure bracketing, and fortunately, it is quite easy to employ this technique. Here’s how.

If possible, mount your camera on a tripod when using bracketing so it won’t move between exposures. Then you can combine several of the exposures into an HDR image later if desired.

If your camera has a bracketing button or menu item, use it to specify how many shots you want to take (I usually shoot 5 or 7 different exposures when bracketing) and how much you want to vary the exposure between each shot and the next (often I choose a 1-stop difference). If your camera lacks this feature, you can still use bracketing by manually adjusting the exposure between each shot and the next; just use your camera’s exposure compensation control to dial in first -2 stops, then -1 stop, then 0, then +1 stop, and finally +2 stops.

I like to set my camera for continuous shooting while bracketing. That way, I just hold down the remote shutter release and the camera shoots all 5 or 7 exposures in rapid succession. But it’s fine to shoot each frame individually in single release mode, if you prefer.

There are some subtleties to think about when employing exposure bracketing. Some cameras let you choose whether to vary the aperture, the shutter speed, or the ISO setting, while holding the other two settings constant. In most cases, I prefer to vary the shutter speed and hold the aperture and ISO settings constant, because changing the aperture affects the images’s depth-of-field, and changing the ISO setting can affect the noise in the image.

Later, during post-processing, you review the images and choose the one that is properly exposed. Or if the scene is very high contrast, you can use photo editing software such as Lightroom or Photoshop to stitch several frames in your series together into an HDR image, which ensures good exposure from the brightest to the darkest tones in your photo.

Several exposures were shot using bracketing and then combined in Photoshop to create this HDR image. All tones from the darkest shadows on the mountain walls to the brightest highlights on the icebergs and lake are properly exposed in the final image. Buy this photo

Have you used exposure bracketing techniques? What are your best practices? Do you use this process mostly for selecting the best exposure or for creating HDR images? Please share your thoughts here.

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