What am I doing wrong? :(

[lavagirl03]

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Hello all, New to this forum as well as photography- I have been trying to follow some rules and I was hoping you could advise on what I am doing wrong now. My photos tend to look blue. Look at this rediculous photo I have attached- I wanted only one of the books to be clear and stand out. It seems i could not not achieve this-

The info for this picture is listed below- If I need a new lens or I am need to change something please advise! I want clear focused crisp images!

Camera Nikon D70
Shot indoors with light from window
ISO 200
White Balance is Cloudy + 3
Shutter 1/80
Aperture 4.5 ( my aperture only opens to 3.5)
Focal length 38mm
I was taken in AP mode
Lens is a Sigma Zoom 28-80mm

Pease help!



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[OsmosisStudios]

Your white balance is wrong. It's set to cloudy but should be set warmer. Dont bother worrying about it: Shoot Auto white balance and RAW files and edit.

[i speak in math]

Like Osmosis said, wrong white balance and its underexposed. You also have 2 different color light sources in the image. When your try to correct the color cast, one side will always be off. Try to use only one color of light when you shoot and choose the white balance that corresponds to that source. Then work on getting your exposure correct. Try learning how to read a histogram and what "expose to the right" means.

I tried to correct the color so that it was somewhere in between the two light source colors and corrected the underexposure using just the levels adjustment layer. The grey eyedropper lets you choose a neutral color in the image, or the white lets you choose something that should be perfectly white.

[BLBJBranch]

As far as only one of the books standing out, that will be hard to achieve, since all the book spines are in the same vertical plane, making the focal distance the same.

Maybe you can stair-step the books to change the focal distance. Then choose the macro mode and focus on a single title??? You may need to monkey with the viewing angle to make it less apparent that the books are stair-stepped.

[lavagirl03]

Thank you for this info! I am going to try this- I thought maybe I should buy a new lens.

[lavagirl03]

Thank you for this advice- I am going to study the histogram and how to read it. Good point! ty!