(This is the first new post made with my new blog software.. Wordpress is awesome.)

Ok, you’re setting up a pretty shot. The sun is shining. Your subject is smiling. Blue skies behind are dotted by puffy white clouds. You compose the image and using the camera’s built in meter, you take the picture.

And the LCD on your camera shows white or flat boring gray skies, some of which is flashing at you.

The dreaded blinkies.

How do you avoid this? Well, first it’s important to know why it happens. The simple answer is that the contrast difference between your subject and the sky is beyond the ability of the digital sensor. Don’t worry, I will explain what that means. (This explanation requires some understanding of proper exposure.)

Imagine a pastoral scene. It’s midday. There is blue sky with puffy clouds, rolling green hills, a stand of trees, and a flock of sheep. Some are under the trees and some are standing in sunlight.

Your eye can see this scene and discern detail in the clouds as well as all the sheep. This is because the human eye can detect more than 30 stops of contrast.

A film photographer might lose cloud detail as well as some sheep detail of those in the deepest shadow, but still see blue sky. Depending on the kind of film, 10-20 stops might be captured.

This is an area where digital fails us. Digital sensors can only capture 5-7 stops of contrast. In our pastoral scene, the hills will be well exposed, but the sky will likely show as white and the sheep in the shade may be featureless black blobs.

Time to switch back to film? Maybe if you want to capture that particular scene, but there are other ways to deal with the problem.

To solve this issue, you have to “flatten” the contrast in your image. All of the targets in the shot need to be ± 2 or 3 stops of your exposure.

Let’s go back to that first example. The exposure of your subject looks good, but your sky is blown out. You need to add more light on your subject.

Hold on. More light?

Yes. You need to get your subject to be closer to the same brightness as the sky.  To see what I mean, meter your subject, then have them step away and meter the sky. If the exposure difference is more than 2 stops, you are going to see blinkies and the sky will be blown out. By adding light on your subject, and adjusting the exposure on your subject accordingly, you can get that sky back – even on digital.

Now there are lots of ways to do this. A reflector to throw light onto your subject is one way. Strobist enthusiasts have filled blogs and books on using small flashes to do it. You can also flatten the contrast by shooting when the sun is lower in the sky. The hardest part is doing it so it looks natural.

Studio and location shooters use this information to their advantage. If the light on your subject is three stops less than your background, you can get completely white. If it’s three stops more than on your background, you can get black.

Additional recommended reading….

Tags: beginner, help, lighting, photography, portrait, strobist