Photographing multiple skin tones

Today I was challenged with a difficult situation (to me). I had my camera on my desk and my co-worker asked me to take a photo of her.

She's African-American with a dark skin tone. She stood infront of a bright window and smiled. The camera hunted and struggled to find her face. 3 seconds of awkward 80-200 ED AF-D mechanical whizzing. I focused on the closest bright article of clothing to her face, her grey hat. I snapped once and she walked over before I could change the settings and try again. Her face was underexposed liked a shadow. I botched it. I was embarrassed.

What's your tip for getting the correct exposure for multiple or dark skin tones? Assuming natural lighting.

Here are my camera settings for my D750:
- I shot in (U2) Manual, F/2.8, 1/200th SS, and Auto-Iso
- AF-C, 3-D (single point, with grouping)
- Metering [ (o) ] <- That's my best way to describe it.

Possible solutions?
- How can I quickly adjust my Exposure Compensation?
- Can I change my Metering to detect on my focus point? I don't think this one would've worked anyway because I focused on her hat. The image was exposed for the hat.
- Other possible solutions?

For someone against a window you want to spot meter on the face "[ . ]". You were center-weighted with is probably better than matrix, but spot would have been better.

As for achieving focus, the D750 should be able grab it. An eye will generally give you enough contrast to achieve focus, and you want to focus on the eye anyway.

I'd also consider using AF-S Single Point for shots like this.

BackdoorHippie said:

For someone against a window you want to spot meter on the face "[ . ]". You were center-weighted with is probably better than matrix, but spot would have been better.

As for achieving focus, the D750 should be able grab it. An eye will generally give you enough contrast to achieve focus, and you want to focus on the eye anyway.

I'd also consider using AF-S Single Point for shots like this.

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When she smiled, her eyes did not give the contrast I needed.
I was frustrated with this but only because of my inadequacies as a photographer.

I think a way to overcome this would've been to direct her to look my way, focus while her eyes are open, remove my finger from back button focus, tell her to smile, snap. I'll try spot metering and try to replicate best methods here in my office.

I'm practicing for upcoming weddings so I'm using AF-C. For things slower paced portraiture, ideally, I should and would use AF-S.

I think you are missing the obvious solution. When anyone asks me to take their photo and then stands anywhere the background is not what I like I tell them "Let's move over here so we get a much better photo"

BackdoorHippie is correct about using AF-S Single Point. That is pretty much the only focus mode I use. I do use Back Button Focus so it can switch between continuous and single depended on where my thumb is.

Panza said:

Here are my camera settings for my D750:
- I shot in (U2) Manual, F/2.8, 1/200th SS, and Auto-Iso


Possible solutions?
- How can I quickly adjust my Exposure Compensation?

Click to expand...

Exposure Compensation doesn't work when you shoot manual.

singlerosa said:

Exposure Compensation doesn't work when you shoot manual.

Click to expand...

Why won't it work? I assumed that the "Auto ISO" has to determine itself off the desired exposure value?

Don Kuykendall said:

I think you are missing the obvious solution. When anyone asks me to take their photo and then stands anywhere the background is not what I like I tell them "Let's move over here so we get a much better photo"

BackdoorHippie is correct about using AF-S Single Point. That is pretty much the only focus mode I use. I do use Back Button Focus so it can switch between continuous and single depended on where my thumb is.

Click to expand...

Most simple solution. And here I am killing myself over settings and controls.

Panza said:

Most simple solution. And here I am killing myself over settings and controls.

Click to expand...

I have had to deal with this over the years. My favorite was shooting a group of Black clients that decided to wear all white. This was back in the days of film so no little screen to look at to see if it worked or not. It is sort of like shooting Bird in Flight though you have to overexpose by one to two stops in order to pick up the dark areas. How much so many times is a matter of experience or luck sometimes. I feel your pain in that you were not given time to set up properly or even check the shot and reshoot.

Don beat me to it. Move the subject to an area that works. It sounds like you were in a terrible setup for any skin color.

singlerosa said:

Exposure Compensation doesn't work when you shoot manual.

Click to expand...

Exposure compensation still affects the metering.

Panza said:

Today I was challenged with a difficult situation (to me). I had my camera on my desk and my co-worker asked me to take a photo of her.

She's African-American with a dark skin tone. She stood infront of a bright window and smiled. The camera hunted and struggled to find her face. 3 seconds of awkward 80-200 ED AF-D mechanical whizzing. I focused on the closest bright article of clothing to her face, her grey hat. I snapped once and she walked over before I could change the settings and try again. Her face was underexposed liked a shadow. I botched it. I was embarrassed.

What's your tip for getting the correct exposure for multiple or dark skin tones? Assuming natural lighting.

Here are my camera settings for my D750:
- I shot in (U2) Manual, F/2.8, 1/200th SS, and Auto-Iso
- AF-C, 3-D (single point, with grouping)
- Metering [ (o) ] <- That's my best way to describe it.

Possible solutions?
- How can I quickly adjust my Exposure Compensation?
- Can I change my Metering to detect on my focus point? I don't think this one would've worked anyway because I focused on her hat. The image was exposed for the hat.
- Other possible solutions?

Click to expand...

Part of the problem may be that Nikon cameras are racist.

Panza said:

Why won't it work? I assumed that the "Auto ISO" has to determine itself off the desired exposure value?

Click to expand...

When you dial in EC, it adjusts aperture or shutter speed up or down, depending what mode you're shooting. You have to be shooting in A, S, P or Auto for this to work. If you're shooting Auto ISO, it's going to adjust itself no matter what. The exposure triangle only has 3 elements and when you shoot manual, you control all 3 (except when you use Auto ISO). EC is redundant to a manual shooter. I might be all wrong here, but I shoot manual and that's the way my bodies work.

When I shot auto-ISO in manual, I used exposure compensation to have some control over ISO.

The cam does not always select the ideal ISO for any situation so I could lower when needed.

singlerosa said:

When you dial in EC, it adjusts aperture or shutter speed up or down, depending what mode you're shooting. You have to be shooting in A, S, P or Auto for this to work. … EC is redundant to a manual shooter. I might be all wrong here, but I shoot manual and that's the way my bodies work.

Click to expand...

At least with my D3200, in M mode, it does provide a metering display to help you set the exposure. I've just now experimented with it, and have determined that changing the exposure compensation does affect the metering. Obviously, it doesn't directly change the aperture or shutter speed, but it does change the meter reading such that if you were using that to determine your exposure, you would set the exposure accordingly.

J-see said:

When I shot auto-ISO in manual, I used exposure compensation to have some control over ISO.

The cam does not always select the ideal ISO for any situation so I could lower when needed.

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Learned something new today! I would not have expected Auto-ISO to work in Manual mode. Good to know!

RocketCowboy said:

Learned something new today! I would not have expected Auto-ISO to work in Manual mode. Good to know!

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It does and is nice, but sometimes it is to your disadvantage.

RocketCowboy said:

Learned something new today! I would not have expected Auto-ISO to work in Manual mode. Good to know!

Click to expand...

Before Auto ISO I would set the camera to Shutter Speed Priority during dim light, set my maximum acceptable ISO and then aperture would usually adjust as needed to the widest possible. Fix in post as needed.

In bright daylight, I would set the camera to Aperture priority mode, Use a very low ISO starting at 100, then let the shutter speed compensate. I'd lower the ISO as the sun went down.

This really sucked so I'm happy they made auto-ISO. I can use my U1 and U2 and never had to adjust my ISO for the daylight again ... (unless I wanted to)

J-see said:

When I shot auto-ISO in manual, I used exposure compensation to have some control over ISO.

The cam does not always select the ideal ISO for any situation so I could lower when needed.

Click to expand...

What's the easiest way to adjust EC? I haven't had much luck searching in settings or on YT for a solution.

Panza said:

What's the easiest way to adjust EC? I haven't had much luck searching in settings or on YT for a solution.

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Button-scroll wheel. You can also change the steps in your settings which speeds up the scrolling.

I don't remember if it's identical for the D750 but on my D7200 I can either select 1/3 or 1/2. It's not much but if you want to quickly dial 3 or 4 stops, it does make a difference.

Don Kuykendall said:

I do use Back Button Focus so it can switch between continuous and single depended on where my thumb is.

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I'm drawing a blank on this. I use AF-S and back button focusing almost exclusively and I can't figure out how this would work without actually changing the focus mode. Care to clarify what you mean/are doing here?