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Shooting in bright sunshine through necessity
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Folks,
I was asked to document a local bike race last Sunday in Wexford. Obviously the weather was its normal glorious best for Wexford but that doesn’t suit midday photography. Below is an example of an image I took (it’s soft as I didn’t resharpen after resizing) but the colours are bleached. If I drop exposure the image looses detail in the darker areas. So, what can be done when shooting in brilliant sunshine is necessary to reduce the bleached out effect?
Alan.
Would a polariser have helped you out I wonder? Maybe increase contrast a little bit?
Use a speedlight. Increase the flash exposure by “X f stops” and decrease the EV (in camera exposure) by the same number. you basically underexpose the ambient thus getting nice contrast and illuminate your subject only by over-exposing your flash exposure.
This photo was taken in full sun light ( so bright it was impossible to keep your eyes open :) )Polarizer might have helped a bit, but I would go ahead and darken the image anyway. Detail isn’t important in the shadows in this particular case, and if it is, use masking tools in photoshop to hold back the darkening effect in the areas you want to protect.
Cheers,
PeterThanks folks. A polariser might have helped. Unfortunately a flash in most of these shots wasn’t useful if you consider the range of the shot above. I did use it on occasion as a fill flash (see below) but not on long lines of cyclists.
I’ll give the contrast a go…the reason I didn’t do it prior to this example was that I had about 60 shots to send to the club and http://www.irishcycling.com on Sunday night in a hurry.Alan.
What range are we talking about?
Nothing is stopping you from placing the flash on the ground near the road and you shooting from a couple of meters behind it. Fill flash wont work in these situations.
Did you try “shadow and highlights” in photoshop? Convert the file into a smart object then apply a couple of masks as peter suggested.Perhaps I’m missing something here but I ran the pics through lightroom, boosted the vibrance tonned down the green a tiny bit to bring it back (and selective yellows in the foreground grass) and boosted clarity (as sharpening), hey presto vivid relistic colours.
I’ll admit to being inexperienced but to me the idea of using flash for this type of thing is going down the proverbial garden path. The example pic given is completely different i.e. a single stationary object where as here we are talking about more dynamic on the move shooting.
D.
Could I ask that you post your resulting image up Darren?
I had to do these in a hurry and briefly ran them through Lightroom purely as a cataloging exercise. I’d prefer to get it nearly right in the field if possible.
Thanks for your reply.
Alan
You should not be afraid of using the flash. The example posted was indeed stationary but so will be your lads on the bicycle once you use the flash. You can use the flash to freeze the motion or to enhance the motion ( front curtain or rear curtain). Position the flash near the road and then camera further down the road. When the group is passing in front of the flash, take the pic…voila..you will have a nice blue sky and properly exposed subjects. :) By the way… professional photographers are using strobes when shooting racing cars and I do believe the speed of those cars is a little bit higher then your subject ;).
two layer masks applied..one for the sky and one for the foreground.
irishwonkafan wrote:
Folks,
I was asked to document a local bike race last Sunday in Wexford. Obviously the weather was its normal glorious best for Wexford but that doesn’t suit midday photography. Below is an example of an image I took (it’s soft as I didn’t resharpen after resizing) but the colours are bleached. If I drop exposure the image looses detail in the darker areas. So, what can be done when shooting in brilliant sunshine is necessary to reduce the bleached out effect?
Alan.
In lightroom, As these should have been shot at a fairly low iso, you should be able to take the black point down to zero and lift the fill. Recovery slider and exposure reduction if needed for the highlights and brightness to suit. I find modern digital cameras can get highlight and shadow details in these conditions.
My first choice would be to not have to shoot from there and find a spot with some natural reflections or better light.
At this location, ideally, a bit of fill (as long as it’s allowed), you might burn your batteries in this level of light though (someone has already said, you can even stick a tripod with a flash at the side of the road to light them evenly as they go past.)All best
Si
Thanks folks. I had a go at the top image again as Simon suggested and it came out as I wanted. I will have a look at the other suggestions also.
My initial request was to assist me to get an acceptable image with some camera assistance and not have to regain reality with software – it’s kind of ironic with me as I twist most images beyond recognition but these had to resemble reality. However Ovidiu – you have given me a great idea for races in the rain. The most common race in these parts in recent years is a time trial due to road safety fears (riders off 1 at a time) – your suggestion has put an image in my head that I want to replicate and will use your idea above…thanks!
Paul & Ovidiu – nice work on the second image…thanks for the pointers.
Simon – believe it or not there was no better position on the 12 mile circuit. It was an elongated triangular circuit and the only place there the sun was directly behind me was on the very point of the elongated V. I could have gone for shelter along the circuit but the shadow and bright reflections was driving the exposure scatty. Yes, I could combine exposures but these had to be mailed off a couple of hours after the race for publication for the following morning.
Thanks all for your help and advice.
Alan
Alan
Few tips.
1.Always check with the organizer if its ok to use a strobe.
2. Do not use a diffuser. If you use the strobe as a fill-in light the diffuser would substantially reduce the amount of light projected. Use the flash bare head projected forward.
3. I would not use the flash in TTL mode when shooting at over 200mm as it would drain your batteries in no time. Get on location a bit earl, put the flash on manual and on the desired position and use someone as a guinea pig until you nail on the exposure. Dont forget that shutter speed controls the ambient light and F stop the light on the subject. Keep this in mind.
4. I dont know what camera you are using but do not bother with using the pop-up flash as a trigger. I use Nikon and the pop-up flash works pretty well as a commander. If I am away from the strobe I can use another SB-900 (this is what I use) as a commander. However, I found that in sunny days (I know, it happens usually once a year on a Thursday:) ) the flash has difficulties firing. I use a sky-port from Elinchrom. Paddy Barker has them in stock.
5. On rainy days keep an eye on light reflecting off the wet surfaces as they can quickly ruin your shot.
6 and the most important..HAVE FUN :)I guess the old fashioned way would be to underexpose the metered reading, this deepens colours under any circumstances as you know and to be honest the loss of shadows isn’t a real photo-killer in a lot of circumstances (step out of the academic and think along the lines ‘lose the shadows, not the shot’!) whereas a bleached out overexposed shot rarely works on any level.
The flash idea is a good one but remember that under this kind of strong sunlight you’ll probably be working above the camera’s sync speed, usually 1/250 though my last two nikons get to 1/320 with little effect on exposure, once you cross that barrier your flash is in focal plane territory and it’s power is reduced dramatically. It will be firing rapidly on full power draining batteries very quickly and you could miss the vital shot during long recycle times. You might want to invest in a quantum battery pack or similar. The other point is a bit of a bizarre one which I read in Light, Science, Magic which, if I’m not gone totally bananas, is that as you move the camera further away from the light source and object it’s lighting, the percieved power of the light source is reduced, even using the same aperture and shutter speed. I know, sounds wierd but I’m pretty sure I didn’t dream it. Will look it up and confirm that if no-one gets there first.
What you might also find is that some participants may not take too kindly to being unexpectedly blinded by a bare bulb flash coming out of nowhere on the side of the road. Could be very dangerous if a rider or driver gets disorientated and no picture is worth that. I would personally only use strong flash when at right angles to the subject so you want to get your timing spot on too.If you are picking a spot in advance you could maybe consider a large reflector, use a handy bright faced building on the roadside or find a very dark background area and overexpose the riders faces that are in shadow as they cross your pre-planned background.
Another thing to mention is that most racing sports photographers aim to get lower shutter speeds to blur wheels and spokes, giving a sense of momentum and speed, and most also use panning techniques to blur the background even more when using tight apertures in bright daylight to get the slower shutter speeds. With smaller apertures of course your really putting huge pressure on your flash again!
Mark Capilitan who contributes here seems to have spent a good few years shooting F1 and might give you a greater wealth of accurate advice on this.
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