Brooks' Photos

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Thanks Dan. Yeah, the rings caught my eye. If I'd have known that my settings were off those would have turned out a lot better. They don't have the depth of the previous set.
 
Hi Aaron,

>Don't know what happened to the first photo, it turned into a attachment that does not work, so reposted it.

I like your ice shots - intriguing contrast of elements

Does your Canon have a histogram or a "specular highlight" mode? This can be quite useful to detect slight overexposure "on location" and adjust the camera settings to avoid it.

The histogram is just a series of bars showing how much of the picture is made up from each brightness level ranging from "completely dark" to "extremely bright". It's easier to use than one would think at the first look - darkest brightness level still shows a substantial bar, you're underexposing, and if the brightest level shows such a substantial bar, you're overexposing. Usually the entire diagram appears to "lean" against either the left or the right limit if you have an exposure problem.

The "specular highlight" mode shows the thumbnail of the shot with the overexposed areas flashing. If you see more than a few pixels flashing, chances are that you are losing detail to overexposure.

Usually, dialing in a couple of aperture steps of manual correction while staying in automatic mode will cure overexposure. It might be worth it to give that a try ... your IMG_1434 picture might have benefitted from it as it shows a very challenging high-contrast motif where the foaming water has been overexposed a bit. For the other pictures in the same post, the effect would be more subtle, but in general you'd probably get a bit more contrast with slightly "darker" exposure settings. (Digital cameras don't have quite the dynamic range of chemical films, so they require a bit more manual attention than I was used to from the old days ...)

I hope my explanations make some sense - don't hesitate to point it out if they don't, I'll try to clarify the best I can!

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)
 
Thank you HoHun for the advice, I believe it does have a specular highlight setting but I will have to check. The camera has got so many different settings and tools it gets confusing and daunting sometimes but I keep shooting.Oh and Gnomey, I had it on the wrong setting before I realized it so I posted to show the difference but being a novice they all needed more adjustments. Thank you guys for taking the time to browse.
 
Nice. I am not as well verse on the Canon cameras as I am a Nikon guy, but I believe that most of the DSLRs out there have programmable buttons. This can be helpful for adjusting ISO on the fly, or white balance, or any number of things. Henning's suggestion about the highlights is excellent. On the Nikon, when I am reviewing a photo, I can use a scroll wheel to look at histograms, highlights and bunch of other data about the photo. Histograms and highlights are the only EXIF data I use in the field. Since the D80 metering system is crap, I check the histograms and highlights a few times a day as the light changes.

Don't forget to work the angles and get out of your comfort box and experiment. Remember, digital is free, only costing disk space. Shoot in different positions, prone, tilted at 45 degrees. Sometimes playing around and doing something you wouldn't normally can give you a cool shot.

Check out this site and sign up for their mailing list. They send out e-mail about once a week with some great tips and articles from the pros. I signed up a few weeks ago and have loved their tips.
Digital Photography School - Digital Photography Tips for You
 
Pretty sure the Rebel's don't have the customisable buttons Eric. Think it only comes on the 40D/50D and above.

I would agree though, check the histograms etc to see what you need to do to improve for the next shot. Also if need to be you can touch things up in a photo editing program such as Photoshop, Paintshop Pro, or the software that is bundled with the camera.
 
Thank you Evanglider for the link, I will use it, thank you. I have not had much time this week to do any studying on setting changes because work has been overwhelming. Half the help is out sick. The Rebel XSI does have the capability to edit photos while still in the camera but as far as what it is able to do I'm not sure of yet. I'm still a little scared of screwing the camera up and not being able to fix it. I should probably just get over it and do it. Thanks again Evan and Gnomey. Your time is much appreciated.
 

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