Using a 50mm lens on a eos300 with bright background

[photoamatuer]

Hi guys,

Very green to photography. Hope to be enlightened on how I should take pics.

Recently got a 2nd hand 50mm f1.8 for my eos300. I tuned my cam setting to "P", so speed and aperture is auto set accordingly.

Took a few shots. Notice that whenever I take photos with quite a bright background, the faces is darker than usually. I used fuji 400 as well as T400CN films and both have this problem. Am I correct to say that my cam does not auto detect the dimness of the faces and should apply to all cams as well, thus flash was not ejected.

So in such situations next time, should I force flash to be used in circumstances where I am not permitted to shift from my position to take the pics?

Does this apply to all lens used in such circumstances?

Thanks in advance.

 

[nickmak]

Hi guys,

Very green to photography. Hope to be enlightened on how I should take pics.

Recently got a 2nd hand 50mm f1.8 for my eos300. I tuned my cam setting to "P", so speed and aperture is auto set accordingly.

Took a few shots. Notice that whenever I take photos with quite a bright background, the faces is darker than usually. I used fuji 400 as well as T400CN films and both have this problem. Am I correct to say that my cam does not auto detect the dimness of the faces and should apply to all cams as well, thus flash was not ejected.

So in such situations next time, should I force flash to be used in circumstances where I am not permitted to shift from my position to take the pics?

Does this apply to all lens used in such circumstances?

Thanks in advance.

it depends... where did u meter ur light? if its towards the bright areas it will make darker objects even darker and vice versa... if faced with that situation use a 18% grey card to get neutral results... hope it helps :gbounce:

 

[photoamatuer]

it depends... where did u meter ur light? if its towards the bright areas it will make darker objects even darker and vice versa... if faced with that situation use a 18% grey card to get neutral results... hope it helps :gbounce:

Oh ya, I did not notice where my meter is focused on, could be towards the light at the background. That's why some pics face are dimmer than others.

btw what's a grey card?

 

[MaGixShOe]

just spot/partial meter on the subject's face. nothing too complicated.

 

[khairi]

it depends... where did u meter ur light? if its towards the bright areas it will make darker objects even darker and vice versa... if faced with that situation use a 18% grey card to get neutral results... hope it helps :gbounce:

how to use the 18% grey card?
do i on my AF or switch to MF?
how far from the card should i meter?

 

[nickmak]

how to use the 18% grey card?
do i on my AF or switch to MF?
how far from the card should i meter?

actually honestly, an 18% grey card is really - just a piece of grey card... its a type of neutral grey colour... can't explain it... that's y pictures say a thousand words... u don't need any directions or distance to meter the card but as long as u do it in a shade on a sunny day or something like that and AE lock. that shoud give u the detail of the settings to use at that time to get good exposed shots...

 

[patch17]

Hi guys,

Very green to photography. Hope to be enlightened on how I should take pics.

Recently got a 2nd hand 50mm f1.8 for my eos300. I tuned my cam setting to "P", so speed and aperture is auto set accordingly.

Took a few shots. Notice that whenever I take photos with quite a bright background, the faces is darker than usually. I used fuji 400 as well as T400CN films and both have this problem. Am I correct to say that my cam does not auto detect the dimness of the faces and should apply to all cams as well, thus flash was not ejected.

So in such situations next time, should I force flash to be used in circumstances where I am not permitted to shift from my position to take the pics?

Does this apply to all lens used in such circumstances?

Thanks in advance.

check your metering pattern. sounds like it's set on evaluative (matrix). camera works out exposure by dividing the entire scene into a number of areas then takes a meter reading from each area and averages it out. since the scene consists of mostly bright white background, it'll tell the camera to stop down (allow less light in to prevent over exposure) and because your subjects' faces are much darker than the light background, they end up under exposed.

you can counter this by adding some fill in flash (i.e. force the flash to fire). the reason why your camera didn't do this in the first place is because cameras are stupid things, their brain tells them: "hey, there's enough light, meter's good so don't need flash."

or you can change the metering pattern to centre weighted or spot. take a reading off the subjects' faces, note it down or use AE lock, recompose your shot and shoot. your subjects' faces should now be correctly exposed.

hope this helps.

oh, by the way... it has nothing to do with your lens.

 

[CaeSiuM]

just spot/partial meter on the subject's face. nothing too complicated.

You'll still have to +/- EV depending on the skin tone of the subject. It's quite different shooting someone tanned and someone very fair.

 

[nickmak]

check your metering pattern. sounds like it's set on evaluative (matrix). camera works out exposure by dividing the entire scene into a number of areas then takes a meter reading from each area and averages it out. since the scene consists of mostly bright white background, it'll tell the camera to stop down (allow less light in to prevent over exposure) and because your subjects' faces are much darker than the light background, they end up under exposed.

you can counter this by adding some fill in flash (i.e. force the flash to fire). the reason why your camera didn't do this in the first place is because cameras are stupid things, their brain tells them: "hey, there's enough light, meter's good so don't need flash."

or you can change the metering pattern to centre weighted or spot. take a reading off the subjects' faces, note it down or use AE lock, recompose your shot and shoot. your subjects' faces should now be correctly exposed.

hope this helps.

oh, by the way... it has nothing to do with your lens.

hehe... cameras are stupid... lol... so much for artificial intelligence... haha... :gbounce:

 

[photoamatuer]

Wow, so many information. thanks guys.

Cool advices. Will take note of these information provided.

 

[justarius]

Just use fillflash to lighten the shadows on your subject's face. It will also have the advantage of adding a pleasing catchlight in your subject's eye.
I tend not to use flash at night (the flash will often burn out the background and all the ambience unless I set it to slow sync, and even then, low shutter speeds without a tripod is a recipe for disaster), but use fill flash all the time during the day, for backlit situations, to add catchlights, etc.

 

[lizter]

just like patch17 said, it normally happens when your subjects is against a bright background. you cant change your metering mood for eos300. it is default to evaluative. unless your subject occoupied almost the whole frame, if not the camera will think that the bright background is too bright and try to set a lower exposure to compensate for it. thus black face.

if your subject is within your flash distance, use fill in flash. if it is out of distance, then its kind of tricky.

you can also try using centre weighted metering on your subject by pressing the button that look like an *. it will lock the exposure then you recompose your shot.

or you can adjust your +/- EV manually. depend on the amount of background and how strong it is. you can stop down either 1 or 2 stop.

the best way is still to use fill in flash.


just my 2 cents. ;p