You all were so helpful the first time I thought I would try again

ccoulson

Senior Member
Hey Guys,

thanks again for discovering that my metering mode was the issue with my photos.Went out this weekend and tried to take some more but Now Im developing a new problem that I never had with my 3000.

It seems that anytime there is contrast in a photo my 7000 blows out the highlights...
Here is an example
650.jpg


f 6.3 / 1/250sec / iso 500 / 50mm

you all were so helpful last time ill take any advice you got
 

ccoulson

Senior Member
Yes. Def. Trying to learn. I feel like I learned my d3000 and it took such consistantly good shots in A and M mode. and When I got my D7000 I feel like I have NO control at all. I appreciate any help you can offer me! Try to be nice if you can :).

I appreciate you guys!
 

fotojack

Senior Member
Print them out and run them through a laminater hot sealer at Kinko's or something. You'll always have them handy. Enjoy. :)
 
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ccoulson

Senior Member
Thanks Jack>> i guess I am unsure of the metering modes, because the little picture that is on the screen of the metering mode matched the button that you put to change the metering mode. LOL. I thought that is what someone told me to put it on. I didnt know there was a pattern mode.

Im not really sure why the shutter speed is 1/200.. I shoot in aperture priority so it chose that for me.
UGH.
 

StringThing

Senior Member
I'm still learning much myself, so take this with that in mind:
If possible, avoid shooting subjects in bright, mid-day sunlight. If you can, move your subjects to a shaded area or have a shaded area as your background.
 

Browncoat

Senior Member
Looks like this photo was metered while being pointed at all those black t-shirts, which is why the background looks so blown out. I would venture to say the using Matrix metering would have yielded better results. No reason why this one should be at 1/200 and ISO 500. It could easily be 1/500 and ISO 200.
 

ccoulson

Senior Member
Hi!!!

I thought my camera was in Matrix mode, is using the button on top of the camera and the wheel not what I use to choose matrix metering??? Is there a menu for it?
 

Obir

Senior Member
So which type of focus would you all choose to best compliment the matrix metering??

What I usually do in this situation is just set focusing to "auto-area" (it finds people's faces and focuses on them) and dial up Active D-lighting to "high" to help get balance. Using fill-in flash usually solves the problem for me also.

Just a thought.
 

Obir

Senior Member
As with most settings, I believe it has its time and place.
Page 139 of the manual has more detail on it. (see below)
It is usually off on my d7000, but I turn to it when I have a very high contrast shot.
I find it helps when shooting outdoors in bright sunlight and lots of shadows.
You may take a few shots with it on and turn it off if you don't like the results.
This is just another option to consider:D
 

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LensWork

Senior Member
What I see is a classic case of where the scene's dynamic range exceeds the sensor's dynamic range, and there is no magical auto mode that will correct it. No matter how sophisticated a camera's matrix metering system is (and yes, your camera was set to Matrix Metering), in some situations like this there is nothing that the camera by itself could have done better. To have a well-balanced exposure in a scene such as this requires some input from the user. This "input" is something that you will learn over time and by asking questions, like you are here. What I would have done differently if I wanted both the background and foreground properly exposed:

1. Lower the ISO. Lower ISO's maximize the camera sensor's dynamic range. A setting of ISO 160 would still yield a sufficiently fast shutter speed to hand-hold and given the static nature of the subjects, been more than fast enough to stop any subject motion.
2. Zoom in on the background and press the AE lock button to set proper exposure on the background (or you could set the exposure mode to manual, and set the exposure yourself based upon the reading while zoomed in on the background).
3. Zoom back out, recompose, focus and use flash to fill-in the subjects. The i-TTL feature of the flash will automatically balance the foreground since it is linked to the focus point(s).

I also noticed in the exif data that the camera was set to manual white balance. Since white balance can effect exposure, if not using auto white balance, make sure that your manual white balance setting is appropriate for the scene. Additionally, your Picture Control settings were +1 on contrast, thereby compounding an already high contrast scene. When shooting with a DSLR it is important to expose for the highlights and you can enhance shadow detail in post-processing (if needed). Blown-out highlights are unrecoverable (with any texture/detail/saturation) in a DSLR. Active D-Lighting may help in scenes such as this.

Hope some of this helps. Keep shooting, experimenting, asking questions and soon enough tricky lighting situations like this will easily be overcome.
 
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ccoulson

Senior Member
Wow! This is so what i need!! Thank you all so much. I read such conflicting information all over the internet, or maybe not conflicting, but just no information to explain how, why or when. This new camera takes so much more thinking on my part, and a lot of the time, there are things Im not thinking of simply because i dont know I should be thinking about them.

I really appreciate everyones help. When I am shooting now, I am keeping all of your tips in mind!! Cant wait to show you all a good result!!
 
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