Clipping issue mostly solved

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AstroEd

AstroEd

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I think I have my clipping issues MOSTLY solved. After an annoying morning of settings and clipping issues I figured out ONE solution and as of yet for the rest of the day I did not have one single clipping issue (As long as I remembered to make the adjustment). I was striving to always get my exposure meter dead center and kept clipping or blowing out my highlights, but after several attempts today I figured out that if I adjust it so the exposure meter is 2-3 spots to the right of center my images do not clip and I can adjust to a more pleasing exposure in lightroom later. I am not sure if this is the right way but at the moment it is working. I am still struggling with which to adjust when and why between ISO, f/ratio, and shutter speed but I am sure I will figure that out once I understand Steves ebooks.
 
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AstroEd said:
I think I have my clipping issues MOSTLY solved. After an annoying morning of settings and clipping issues I figured out ONE solution and as of yet for the rest of the day I did not have one single clipping issue (As long as I remembered to make the adjustment). I was striving to always get my exposure meter dead center and kept clipping or blowing out my highlights, but after several attempts today I figured out that if I adjust it so the exposure meter is 2-3 spots to the right of center my images do not clip and I can adjust to a more pleasing exposure in lightroom later. I am not sure if this is the right way but at the moment it is working. I am still struggling with which to adjust when and why between ISO, f/ratio, and shutter speed but I am sure I will figure that out once I understand Steves ebooks.
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Well that's a safe way to avoid overexposure but it's not ideal and makes it hard to review images in the field that will look very dark.

If you shoot in an automated exposure mode such as: Shutter Priority, Aperture Priority or even Manual Exposure with Auto ISO a simple way is to take one test shot when your shooting situation or light changes substantially. Then look at that image in image review on the back of the camera. Look at the histogram and make sure there's not a vertical spike on the right hand side of the histogram as that means clipped highlights.

If you enable Highlights in the Playback menu you can also check what folks call 'Blinkies', basically with Highlights enabled when you review the image on the Highlights screen any clipped whites will blink on and off telling you the light and the overall scene needs to be compensated. So if you see blinkies when reviewing your test image you dial in some negative exposure compensation until a test shot shows no blinkies. Otherwise don't dial in exposure compensation and leave the exposure comp at zero (or even positive if your images are coming out very dark).

When your shooting situation changes a lot, for instance going from shooting bright white birds like Egrets to shooting dark animals like Bears or if the light changes a lot then quickly take a test shot and check your histogram, blinkies or both and make an adjustment if necessary and then go on shooting until the situation changes a lot.

Definitely read Steve's books and he has some good videos on understanding exposure on the main Backcountry Galleries website but shooting a couple of stops underexposed all the time to avoid clipped highlights would not be the approach I'd recommend.
 
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AstroEd said:
I think I have my clipping issues MOSTLY solved. After an annoying morning of settings and clipping issues I figured out ONE solution and as of yet for the rest of the day I did not have one single clipping issue (As long as I remembered to make the adjustment). I was striving to always get my exposure meter dead center and kept clipping or blowing out my highlights, but after several attempts today I figured out that if I adjust it so the exposure meter is 2-3 spots to the right of center my images do not clip and I can adjust to a more pleasing exposure in lightroom later. I am not sure if this is the right way but at the moment it is working. I am still struggling with which to adjust when and why between ISO, f/ratio, and shutter speed but I am sure I will figure that out once I understand Steves ebooks.
Click to expand...

If you are a Nikon user and if your camera has this feature, you can fine tune the exposure in the b7 menu (on my D850). Since I had my D700 I set my cameras to minus 1/6th of a stop for highlights in all metering modes. You can set any value you like, but for me 1/6th works. You can also make other changes too.
 
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dabhand16 said:
If you are a Nikon user and if your camera has this feature, you can fine tune the exposure in the b7 menu (on my D850). Since I had my D700 I set my cameras to minus 1/6th of a stop for highlights in all metering modes. You can set any value you like, but for me 1/6th works. You can also make other changes too.
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Nikon D500. I am still learning settings from various YouTube videos on Nikon wildlife photography.
 
AstroEd said:
I think I have my clipping issues MOSTLY solved. After an annoying morning of settings and clipping issues I figured out ONE solution and as of yet for the rest of the day I did not have one single clipping issue (As long as I remembered to make the adjustment). I was striving to always get my exposure meter dead center and kept clipping or blowing out my highlights, but after several attempts today I figured out that if I adjust it so the exposure meter is 2-3 spots to the right of center my images do not clip and I can adjust to a more pleasing exposure in lightroom later. I am not sure if this is the right way but at the moment it is working. I am still struggling with which to adjust when and why between ISO, f/ratio, and shutter speed but I am sure I will figure that out once I understand Steves ebooks.
Click to expand...

I might be misunderstanding, especially since I shoot Canon. Wouldn't move the meter to the right be brightening the image even more? Also are you using matrix metering? That should handle a lot of lighting situations without needing to compensate.
 
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I agree with @DRwyoming in needing to understand the exposure settings to know when to apply what. If you were to shoot a white bird against a darker background on a bright day your meter would most likely need to show you’re underexposing in order to not lose all detail in the bird feathers. The opposite would be true for say a Raven against a bright blue sky as it would likely show you as overexposing to get the ideal exposure. These examples are easy to understand, but it can get a little more complicated depending on the subject. For example, a black bear in the trees could go either way depending on the lighting. Unfortunately there is no solution that works in every situation. Once you get the basics, things will begin to make sense.
 
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abc123brian said:
I agree with @DRwyoming in needing to understand the exposure settings to know when to apply what. If you were to shoot a white bird against a darker background on a bright day your meter would most likely need to show you’re underexposing in order to not lose all detail in the bird feathers. The opposite would be true for say a Raven against a bright blue sky as it would likely show you as overexposing to get the ideal exposure. These examples are easy to understand, but it can get a little more complicated depending on the subject. For example, a black bear in the trees could go either way depending on the lighting. Unfortunately there is no solution that works in every situation. Once you get the basics, things will begin to make sense.
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Yes, so far I have a terrible time getting detail on Pelicans, the occasional White Egret, and black colored birds. I need more practice but they are either hardly around my area or very far away.
 
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How the camera/meter deals with exposure is counter intuitive. It's trying to make everything look like average grey. So it will make bright scenes too dark and dark scenes too light. So you have to compensate the opposite direction. For dark scenes you compensate for the camera by reducing exposure. Counter intuitive.

Also if using matrix metering the camera doesn't know what the subject is. So if a small portion of the frame is filled by the subject you may have to compensate even more. For example a white bird in front of dark foliage. Without heavy compensation will be way over exposed.
 
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If I a reading your post correctly you were clipping highlights, so your highlights were overexposed, then you moved the meter 2 or 3 spots to the right which would be increasing the exposure by 2/3 to 1 stop, that should have caused more clipping, or am I not thinking correctly.

Remember every scene is different!
 
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MartyD said:
If I a reading your post correctly you were clipping highlights, so your highlights were overexposed, then you moved the meter 2 or 3 spots to the right which would be increasing the exposure by 2/3 to 1 stop, that should have caused more clipping, or am I not thinking correctly.

Remember every scene is different!
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I think the exposure meter is backwards in Nikon cameras. I believe that can be changed by selecting "reverse indicators" under menu option F7.
 
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With larger white or light colored birds normally I’ll spot meter the bird with a-1/3 to -2/3 exposure compensation. If the background was dark to start with it will get quite a bit darker. Kinda a different way of controlling background.
 
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AstroEd said:
Yes, so far I have a terrible time getting detail on Pelicans, the occasional White Egret, and black colored birds. I need more practice but they are either hardly around my area or very far away.
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Pelicans and egrets can be challenging for sure. For pelican, because there is so much white, I tend to use a tighter metering area or highlight priority and expose for that. Make small adjustments to the rest during processing.

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You can also use negative exposure comp as well. Every Nikon digital body I’ve owned required between -1/3 and -1 exposure comp to eliminate blown whites.
 
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gKhan said:
Thanks, I wondered about that.
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FWIW, I would NOT recommend fine tuning exposure settings until you've mastered basic exposure and exposure compensation for different scenes and different lighting situations. You can easily make things more confusing by starting down the path of altering the way your camera's meter behaves unless you've got a good grasp on what and why you're doing that.
 
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The other issue with underexposing to avoid clipping an image is that you lose data. Ideally, you want to correctly expose your subject, without overexposing, but knowing that data can generally be pulled back in post processing if it is not clipped. I know there are photographers who like to underexpose their images to get a certain look as part of their style, but I always found that approach leaving me with muddy shadows. In either event, nailing exposure for the subject matter is the first order of business.

Good luck,

--Ken
 
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Some of the replies to this thread are talking about the dangers of underexposing and I'm completely on board with everything said on that. However that is if you underexpose across the board.

Just to make it clear, fine tuning optimal exposure can be applied very selectively. I have the highlights only set to minus 1/6 of a stop. This does not affect the exposure for other areas of the frame. It just gives a little help to reduce clipping highlights.

The original post here said " I was striving to always get my exposure meter dead center and kept clipping or blowing out my highlights " and this is one way to stop or reduce it. If after trying different settings anyone is not happy with the results, the settings can always be put back to default.

Something that has not yet been said is "Are you looking at the LCD to check for clipping or viewing RAW files on a computer?" Bear in mind that if you look at the LCD and have highlight blinkies turned on, the embedded jpg in the RAW file is what you are seeing (as is the histogram) so that image might show clipping/blinkies where the RAW file won't.
 
dabhand16 said:
Some of the replies to this thread are talking about the dangers of underexposing and I'm completely on board with everything said on that. However that is if you underexpose across the board.

Just to make it clear, fine tuning optimal exposure can be applied very selectively. I have the highlights only set to minus 1/6 of a stop. This does not affect the exposure for other areas of the frame. It just gives a little help to reduce clipping highlights.

The original post here said " I was striving to always get my exposure meter dead center and kept clipping or blowing out my highlights " and this is one way to stop or reduce it. If after trying different settings anyone is not happy with the results, the settings can always be put back to default.

Something that has not yet been said is "Are you looking at the LCD to check for clipping or viewing RAW files on a computer?" Bear in mind that if you look at the LCD and have highlight blinkies turned on, the embedded jpg in the RAW file is what you are seeing (as is the histogram) so that image might show clipping/blinkies where the RAW file won't.
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Can you explain more on how you expose the highlights only? My understanding was you could only have one exposure. Or are you talking about in post processing?
 
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bleirer said:
Can you explain more on how you expose the highlights only? My understanding was you could only have one exposure. Or are you talking about in post processing?
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It is tweaking selected parts of the exposure, not exposing the highlights only separately . Rather like the highlights slider in Lightroom or other RAW converters that only affects highlights and not other areas of the image unless you use too much.

I'm reducing the highlights only by 1/6th pf a stop at the time of the exposure by the camera settings I've applied.

You don't hear people saying that as you've pulled shadows and/or reduced highlights by tweaking the sliders in post it has ruined other areas of the image - unless it is over-done.
 
dabhand16 said:
It is tweaking selected parts of the exposure, not exposing the highlights only separately . Rather like the highlights slider in Lightroom or other RAW converters that only affects highlights and not other areas of the image unless you use too much.

I'm reducing the highlights only by 1/6th pf a stop at the time of the exposure by the camera settings I've applied.

You don't hear people saying that as you've pulled shadows and/or reduced highlights by tweaking the sliders in post it has ruined other areas of the image - unless it is over-done.
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I see. So the actual exposure is the same for the whole shot in terms of shutter speed and f stop, but the camera settings might adjust the curve, etc. same as doing it in post.

I guess I'm thinking if the exposure causes a highlight to be clipped it's still going to be a problem.
 
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dabhand16 said:
It is tweaking selected parts of the exposure, not exposing the highlights only separately . Rather like the highlights slider in Lightroom or other RAW converters that only affects highlights and not other areas of the image unless you use too much.

I'm reducing the highlights only by 1/6th pf a stop at the time of the exposure by the camera settings I've applied.

You don't hear people saying that as you've pulled shadows and/or reduced highlights by tweaking the sliders in post it has ruined other areas of the image - unless it is over-done.
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Are you referring to Nikon picture control settings?
 
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