Playback Images

NStorm

New member
Help! When I go to the playback screen to see my images-they are highlighting the white/light bits with black patches. They flash on & off the screen. Have I bumped a setting somewhere and how can I get it back to normal?

Thanks
Natalie
 

mikew_RIP

Senior Member
Been out of the Nikon loop for a while but have you tried the down arrow on the multi selector while an image is showing.

700px-Nikon_AF_point_selector_535.jpg
 

Marilynne

Administrator
Staff member
Super Mod
Go to Playback Menu, then Playback display options, then unclick Highlights, then done. Page 150 in the D5100 User's manual.

Oops, forgot to say Welcome!
 
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Bikerbrent

Senior Member
Welcome aboard. Enjoy the ride.
We look forward to seeing more posts and samples of your work.

I believe the previous responses should solve your problem.
 

nikonpup

Senior Member
YOU HAVE "BLINKIES" TURNED ON - NOT A BAD THING. READ THIS BY MOOSE PETERSON.

What in the heck are blinkies and more importantly, what can they do for your photography? You will only find blinkies (that's what I call them), or more commonly called Highlight Warning, on digital cameras. Blinkies visually indicate the areas of a photograph where the exposure is beyond the range of the film. Blinkies literally blink black and white at you. You have to turn the blinkies on to make them flash, but when this feature of your monitor preview is active, you will know instantly and visually where you have an exposure problem!

Blinkies are a visual clue to exposure problems. You visually can see exactly where in your image you have lighting problems. There are no numbers to decipher, no Histograms to analyze, just black blotches that blink at you, telling you your pixels are saying, ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch!

Digital has exposure latitude just like conventional film and when you go beyond that range, you literally will have no information, zero, which is what causes the blinkies. If the exposure range is extreme, you could suffer not only from over exposure but also pixel bloom. But you don't have to worry about any of this if you have Highlight Warning (blinkies) active and you know to look for them. Because when you see blinkies you then know you have a problem with exposure.

Going back to the split graduated neutral density filter, it's a snap to use it using the monitor with blinkies active. Take your first image when you think you need to use the filter and then look at the monitor. Blinkies will occur in those areas where there are highlights blown out; blinkies are the area of the image that must have the help of that split filter. Now attach that split graduated neutral density filter, slide it down and take the next photo. If you've done it right you now have no blinkies and you have a technically perfect exposure (which might not be the same as the perfect exposure, but that's another article). If you still have blinkies, adjust your filter accordingly. With digital, you know instantly if you're doing it right or wrong. You can take blinkies to another level in creating the perfect landscape, which takes us into the digital darkroom.

There are certain situations where there is no way, no matter what tools, techniques and talents we might bring that we can capture in just one image the exposure range our brain is exposing on our mind. A perfect example is a waterfall. When photographing waterfalls, our subject is the falling water. Photographing them in no direct light, before the sun even rises, there is no way we can capture the highlights of our subject, the water, and the shadows of the world around it, in just one image. This is not a problem with digital.

We take our first image at the proper exposure for the whole scene and then look at the monitor and see what blinkies appear. With the camera on a tripod and locked into place, we dial in exposure compensation to properly expose for just the highlights and take a second photo. We check our results on the monitor and if we've dialed in the correct exposure comp, we have no blinkies. We now have two images, pin registered by the very nature of digital that we can now combine in the digital darkroom to have a full tonal print, preserving all highlight detail of our subject.

Blinkies are the most magical way for any photographer to learn light and exposure. Since light is what makes the landscape before us magical, it's the perfect marriage of technology and talent!
 
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