Hi, I live in India where we have every possible shade of skin colour, from very fair to very dark. I travel a lot with work and try to click a few snaps when I get a chance but find that when there is a dark skinned person I often get an underexposed image, while the rest of the background of other things are just right. I read a lot about this on the internet and find suggestions about using extra flash lights and a lot of other technical stuff but that all applies to situations that you can control, like in a studio. What about when you are a tourist and simply cannot change anything, and you have to be quick too!
Here is a sample of a man who I photographed.
Nikon D40
Exposure: 1/200
Aperture: f/7.1
ISO: 200
As you can see he is dark and his face details are hidden. If you go here
woman on steps | Flickr - Photo Sharing!
dancing girl | Flickr - Photo Sharing!
you can see two more examples. The "dancing girl" turned out fine because she was facing the sun. But the father who is "the musician" is in some shade. The "woman on the steps" is another example where I thought the rest of the picture turned out fine but her face did not.
Could you give some tips on how to handle this? Also wanted to add that sometimes I think that if I come around to another angle to get someone's face they will see me and become conscious and the composition will get spoilt. What do you think?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/organize/
(I hope these links work)
Please excuse me if these links turn out wrongly pasted. Am new to this!!
Thanks!
Bindu