Best Settings NEX5N - Avoid blown out/over exposed skies

[bayard1music]

Hello,

I've got one of these fine cameras , and have used on one or two short trips abroad from the UK. Like my RX100 I notice on a number of my images the sky is white, when in reality it's probably a bit blue.  I think I've got my exposure wrong on these shots.Overexposed?

 I use a mixture of automatic and semi manual settings such as Program Mode. Can somebody give me some general guides to the best settings in bright light. (Last year I was in Rome in April). Difficult to simulate the lighting here in the UK. I'm not a professional photographer by training but told I have a good 'eye' for a picture. I'd like to improve my results of course. Historically I tend to set the ISO to 100 (80 on the RX100) this is a bit of a hang over from my days with my smaller sensor cameras. Would I be better off for example using a highter ISO? Will this make a difference? Forgive me if this subject has been covered before. I just can't see a good authoritive guide that would suit a mostly point and shoot but critical user. Thanks in advance.

Alan

[Watashiwateshdes]

Hey and welcome to the Community. 

Glad to see that you are looking into this in more detail. Most people wouldn't actually bother but there are some steps you can focus on to help this from happening. I hope this gives you some starting points to help you get going. I have thrown up a lot below be warned 🙂

To help nail the lighting conditions is working on how the camera meters. There are a few various modes which will result in a different photo (in most situations)

• The first is Evaluative Metering which takes a light reading from the entire photo but mainly from the focus point that has been selected. This by default is what most people use. The problem is that it will have a knack of blowing out skies if you are not careful. Especially if there is a high contrast different like in skies for example.

• Next comes Centre-Weighted which basically takes an overall reading of the light over the entire frame. If there is a lot of sky then you might have a dark building or foreground. This would be worth trying as a starting point I would say.

• You also have Spot which meters the very central potion of your frame which would be good if you wanted to nail something and had too many variations in light or wanted specifically to blow out certain areas. Also partial metering which takes a slightly larger meter but still central to the frame.

The best thing I would do is experiement with the metering but also have a look at the DRO options you have available. 

What you also need to check is your exposure level usually represented by -3...-2...-1...0...1...2...3. If you find that its blowing certain bits out, it could be the needle is in the positive. In most situations, you should aim to have it at 0 but can use it to your advantage. By pushing the needle into the negatives, you can force the camera to underexpose the shot slightly thus potentially preserving the sky. 

It's good that you raised the point about the ISO but the rule of thumb shout be, whatever focal lens you are set to, the shutter speed should be equal or faster (don't have to be extreme). So if you focal length is set at 55mm, then you shutter speed should be 1/60 or faster. If you bump you ISO up too high then you run the risk of exceeding your max shutter speed which will then cause overexposed images. Auto ISO usually does a good job but I like to stay in control. I tend to shuffle between ISO100-400.

You also have the HDR options which might work to your advantage. The camera takes one photo underexposed, one correctly exposed and one overexposed and then combins them taking the correct bits from each photo. I enjoy the concept of it however sometimes the photos can loose their punch or look a little "painted". Not always the case but something I would consider experiementing with. It is good for when you are indoors or in a cathedral perhaps. It should preserve the light coming through the windows from being blown out.

My recommendation would be to set your camera up on a tripod if you have one, if not just a table where you can fiddle around with it and point it outside. Worth through the different metering modes and try out the HDR option. It may not fully fix the issue but it might help get you started.

[Bieomax]

Do you shoot in Jpeg or Raw ? as you've also got a little leeway if you've still not managed to nail it with all of the above if you shoot in raw as you can then pull some details back from shadows and highlights when you use photo editing software, as long as its not fully blown out to white or black but then quite often there is still alot of detail on the picture which we just can't see but the computer can, but its always best to try and nail it first time.

if you wanted you can always have a play with adding a filter to the front of the camera, like a gradient filter which will help with a bright sky, but this of course means carrying something extra in your bag.

also some photo editing software will allow you to add a gradient filter which will allow you to play with the exposure of the sky separately.