It seems that you got lost, but we are here to help
The page that you are looking for doesn’t exist on this website. You may have accidentally mistyped the page address, or followed an expired link. Anyway, we will help you get back on track. Why don’t you try one of these pages for starters.
Page not found – Photoxels
404 error: Page not found
It seems that you got lost, but we are here to help
The page that you are looking for doesn’t exist on this website. You may have accidentally mistyped the page address, or followed an expired link. Anyway, we will help you get back on track. Why don’t you try one of these pages for starters.
Page not found – Photoxels
404 error: Page not found
It seems that you got lost, but we are here to help
The page that you are looking for doesn’t exist on this website. You may have accidentally mistyped the page address, or followed an expired link. Anyway, we will help you get back on track. Why don’t you try one of these pages for starters.
Page not found – Photoxels
404 error: Page not found
It seems that you got lost, but we are here to help
The page that you are looking for doesn’t exist on this website. You may have accidentally mistyped the page address, or followed an expired link. Anyway, we will help you get back on track. Why don’t you try one of these pages for starters.
Page not found – Photoxels
404 error: Page not found
It seems that you got lost, but we are here to help
The page that you are looking for doesn’t exist on this website. You may have accidentally mistyped the page address, or followed an expired link. Anyway, we will help you get back on track. Why don’t you try one of these pages for starters.
You
are here: Home
> Tutorials
> What Is... Exposure Bracketing?
It seems that you got lost, but we are here to help
The page that you are looking for doesn’t exist on this website. You may have accidentally mistyped the page address, or followed an expired link. Anyway, we will help you get back on track. Why don’t you try one of these pages for starters.
What Is... Exposure Bracketing
Exposure bracketing is a simple technique professional photographers use to ensure they properly expose their pictures, especially in challenging lighting situations.
When you expose for a scene, your camera's light meter will select an aperture
/ shutter speed combination that it believes will give a properly exposed picture.
Exposure bracketing means that you take two more pictures: one slightly under-exposed
(usually by dialing in a negative exposure compensation, say -1/3EV), and the
second one slightly over-exposed (usually by dialing in a positive exposure
compensation, say +1/3EV), again according to your camera's light meter.
The reason you do this is because the camera might have been 'deceived' by
the light (too much or too little) available and your main subject may be over-
or under-exposed. By taking these three shots, you are making sure that if this
were ever the case, then you would have properly compensated for it.
As an example, say you are taking a scene where there is an abundance of light
around your main subject (for example, at the beach on a sunny day, or surrounded
by snow). In this case, using Weighted-Average metering, your camera might be
'deceived' by the abundance of light and expose for it by closing down the aperture
and/or using a faster shuter speed (assuming ISO is constant), with the result
that the main subject might be under-exposed. By taking an extra shot at a slight
over-exposure, you would in fact be over-exposing the surroundings, but properly
exposing the main subject.
Another example would be the case where the surrounding might be too dark,
and the camera exposes for the lack of light by either opening up the aperture
and/or using a slower shutter speed (assuming ISO is constant), then the main
subject might be over-exposed. By taking an extra shot at a slight under-exposure,
you would in fact be under-exposing the surroundings, but properly exposing
the main subject.
Now, most digital cameras have auto exposure bracketing (AEB), meaning that
if you select that option before taking your shot, the camera will automatically
take three shots for you: one which it thinks it has perfectly exposed; a second
one sightly under-exposed; and the third one slightly over-exposed. The amount
of under- and over-exposure usually defaults to -1/3EV and +1/3EV, but can also
sometimes to specified in SETUP, e.g. you may want to use -1EV and +1EV instead.
When should you use exposure bracketing? Anytime you feel the scene is a challenging
one (too much highlights or shadows) as far as lighting is concerned -- e.g.
sunsets are usually better taken slightly under-exposed so use exposure bracketing
there -- or whenever you want to be sure you don't improperly expose a fabulous
shot that you may not get the chance to go back and take again.
Remember, you are not using film anymore, so there are really no wasted shots
(unless you are severely constrained by the size of your storage media).
Digital Dodging & Burning
Should you delete the extra shots right away? No, if storage permits, keep
all three shots until you get home and upload them to your PC and into an image
editing software, such as Photoshop. By using the layers feature of Photoshop
(or similar feature of another image editing software), you can load all three
shots into different layers and then carefully erase the under-exposed or over-exposed
part of one or more layers to end up with a final shot where both the main subject
and the surroundings are properly exposed!
With this layers feature in mind, you may now fearlessly shoot in very extreme
lighting situations where there are many parts in different intensity of light
and shadows such that you are losing details in the highlights and shadows.
In this case, you might need more than two extra shots to obtain details in
the different parts. Without moving the camera (a tripod is essential here),
take as many shots as you need, exposing for the different parts you want details
to be visible. Then you would load them all up into Photoshop, each into its
own layer, and by erasing the under- and over-exposed parts in each layer (granted,
this equivalent of film 'dodging' and 'burning' can be a very tedious and challenging
task in itself, but done properly it can be well worth the effort), you can
end up with an 'impossible' shot where every part of the cave is properly exposed.
In a studio setting, again with camera on tripod, you move a portable studio
light around to different parts of a subject (e.g. a car) and work your magic
in your image editing software to produce an image that is "impossibly"
perfectly exposed all around.
Used judiciously, exposure bracketing is a simple technique that can ensure
proper exposure of a difficult lighting situation.
Many digital cameras targeted to advanced amateur photographers provide a RAW
file format. This option allows you to save your image data as nearly identical
as it is captured by the image sensor -- theoretically with no processing applied
(though in practice, a minimal amount of necessary processing may be applied,
depending on the algorithm used).
It is equivalent to a digital negative and allows the photographer to manipulate
this RAW image data after the fact in an image editing software (with the appropriate
RAW plug-in) to produce a picture that is correctly exposed and with faithful
colour reproduction.
If your camera provides that option, you may want to experiment a bit -- you'll
see that it pretty much allows you to perform some exposure bracketing after
the fact.
Some professional photographers only takes pictures in RAW while others don't.
It all depends on how much control over the final image they need. The downside
of using RAW: saving images in the RAW file format takes much more memory
space and takes longer to write to memory -- plus you need to process every
single image.
Page not found – Photoxels
404 error: Page not found
It seems that you got lost, but we are here to help
The page that you are looking for doesn’t exist on this website. You may have accidentally mistyped the page address, or followed an expired link. Anyway, we will help you get back on track. Why don’t you try one of these pages for starters.
Page not found – Photoxels
404 error: Page not found
It seems that you got lost, but we are here to help
The page that you are looking for doesn’t exist on this website. You may have accidentally mistyped the page address, or followed an expired link. Anyway, we will help you get back on track. Why don’t you try one of these pages for starters.
It seems that you got lost, but we are here to help
The page that you are looking for doesn’t exist on this website. You may have accidentally mistyped the page address, or followed an expired link. Anyway, we will help you get back on track. Why don’t you try one of these pages for starters.
Page not found – Photoxels
404 error: Page not found
It seems that you got lost, but we are here to help
The page that you are looking for doesn’t exist on this website. You may have accidentally mistyped the page address, or followed an expired link. Anyway, we will help you get back on track. Why don’t you try one of these pages for starters.
Page not found – Photoxels
404 error: Page not found
It seems that you got lost, but we are here to help
The page that you are looking for doesn’t exist on this website. You may have accidentally mistyped the page address, or followed an expired link. Anyway, we will help you get back on track. Why don’t you try one of these pages for starters.
You
are here: