Dance Recital Frustration

[donquixote]

I'm a newbie here, and I'm looking for advice from more experienced photographers. I recently bought a Nikon L830 for family & vacation photography. I was impressed with the video quality, and I chose it over the Canon sx520 for what I considered better lowlight photo and video capabilities. I was hoping the L830 would be suitable for shooting video of my daughter's dance recital, but I was disappointed in the results. Dancers under the lights looked washed out and pale. The auto focus got confused as dancers moved from the brighter areas of the stage to the less brightly lit areas. I tried a few adjustments between dances with little success. Is there a secret to shooting decent video in these situations, or am I asking the near impossible for a small sensor camera? Would a dslr do any better in these situations? Of course my L830 is a champ when the lighting is good, but is it possible to get good video in these tricky situations?

 

[Moab Man]

The difficulty your having is that you need to take manual control. The camera computer is overwhelmed.

The camera sees it as something overall dark that needs to be exposed for thereby washing out where the light is hitting.

You taking manual control can then adjust the exposure for what matters.

 

[480sparky]

It most likely stems from your not taking the time to learn how to use the camera in the lighting situation you were in. I have no experience with that camera, but it probably would perform well if it were set up correctly. As MM said, manual control would be the best, coupled with knowing how to set the camera based on the lighting situation.

You were probably shooting bright dancers against a black or dark background. The dancers took up a very small portion of the frame, while the background comprised the bulk of the video's real estate area. The camera will tend to look at that and, according to it's programming, see a large dark image. So it will automatically increase exposure in an attempt to balance out all the dark areas.

 

[donquixote]

Thanks for the replies. The stage indeed has a black backdrop, which the camera probably had a hard time compensating for with just a few dancers on stage. It is hard to practice and try different settings since I encounter this challenging lighting only once or twice a year. The L830 lacks full manual controls, but it does allow me to manually set the white balance, track a subject with the focus and of course adjust the exposure compensation. Which of these would most benefit my attention next time I have the opportunity to shoot a similarly lighted subject? Maybe all need to be controlled as much as possible? The L830, unfortunately, does not have full manual controls, so it looks like these variables are the only ones I can work with. Am I missing some other adjustment that could help?

 

[hark]

The L830 lacks full manual controls, but it does allow me to manually set the white balance, track a subject with the focus and of course adjust the exposure compensation. Which of these would most benefit my attention next time I have the opportunity to shoot a similarly lighted subject? Maybe all need to be controlled as much as possible? The L830, unfortunately, does not have full manual controls, so it looks like these variables are the only ones I can work with. Am I missing some other adjustment that could help?

I don't do video, but I do regularly photograph my local high school's drama productions. If you have the option to manually set your white balance, do it.

And if you can override the exposure with some type of exposure compensation, you want to under expose by @ -1.0 to -1.7 stops (maybe -2 stops if they are in a really bright spot light). This will be based on metering that is similar to Nikon's matrix metering (where it reads the entire area within the viewfinder). It will vary depending on whether a person is in a brighter lit area of the stage or a lesser lit area. If a person is in the shadows, then you need to adjust it accordingly and not have it under exposed much, if at all.

Haven't used focus tracking so I can't offer you any suggestions there.

 

[PapaST]

I always seemed to have better autofocus results with P&S cameras like the L830 opposed to a DSLR when shooting videos. The depth of field on a smaller sensored camera coupled with a typically smaller aperture usually meant most things were in focus to begin with. It's odd that it struggled that much.

Like most mentioned, the overexposed dancers was likely due to the metering mode you had selected. It would be better to try and spot meter on the dancers rather than meter the entire scene because of the mostly black background.

My daughter had her recital this past weekend and it is tricky getting the shot right. Good luck to you in the future.

BM6_0648 by Bernard Malinis, on Flickr