Assessing Contrast – The Squint Technique
Here’s a surprising little tip that a pro once shared with me when thinking about contrast in images. It’s not really conventional but it works!
When setting up an image to shoot you can assess the contrast levels in a scene and see how the camera will ‘see’ it by squinting.
More specifically – close one of your eyes completely and then squint with the other.
With eyes wide open we’re able to take in a lot of visual information from a scene – more than even the best camera is able to process but what you’re doing by squinting is reducing the range of what you’re seeing and are leaving yourself with the highlights and shadows (ie you’re taking out a lot of the mid-tones).
Give it a try – you might look a little silly (probably not as silly as the guy in this shot) – but it might just help you improve your images a touch too!
PS: One of our readers ‘boyan’ also made this comment on this technique:
“Galen Rowell recommends the same technique in one of his books, but in a different context – it allows you to concentrate on shapes rather than colors, and helps you compose better. An alternative is to stop down the lens and use the DOF preview button – I believe that I read that on Thom Hogan’s site.”
10 Responses to “Assessing Contrast – The Squint Technique” - Add Yours
September 14th, 2009 at 8:23 am
It’s a great technique that I used when lighting locations for television in my time at the BBC. Doesn’t work when lighting with flash though so I’d forgotten about it until now. Thanks for the reminder.
Damien.
September 14th, 2009 at 11:07 am
I have never tried this technique before. Thanks for sharing.
September 14th, 2009 at 12:07 pm
Very nice, I will have to try this out.
September 14th, 2009 at 3:06 pm
Ha!
That’s funny idea, gotta try it (and make sure no one is near me when I do that)
So far I was counting mostly on my ‘senses’ and ‘taste’ when checking contrast – for example – http://www.ilanbresler.com/2009/07/black-and-white.html – but this sounds like an interesting way of examining it.
Will try it!
September 15th, 2009 at 1:26 am
I can’t do squinting – I find my field of vision decreases too much for me to assess the overall.
Instead, I slightly cross my eyes – yes, I know it sounds daft, but it works for me. I find I can still see the entire picture, but all the detail disappears leaving me with a true appreciation of colour tones and light and dark. Give it a go (if you can cross your eyes)!..
September 18th, 2009 at 2:18 am
…valuable tip; thanks!
September 18th, 2009 at 6:51 am
I’ve been doing the “squint” to check out my Christmas tree lights for decades. Works for that too – you can easily see where there are gaps….
September 18th, 2009 at 2:01 pm
I was taught this technique as well when I was studying Art in school….
Thanks so much for sharing!
Best wishes,
Jonathan
September 18th, 2009 at 6:02 pm
Yep it is a really useful technic. I’ve been using this method ever since I have painted. As you say it takes out some of the detail and helps you to focus on what is really going on.
September 18th, 2009 at 7:09 pm
I am a shoot assisstant and I see my photographer do that a lot. Interesting.
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