Snowball Fun

[yulchick]

Hi there, I took this picture of my daughter a few days ago, and I really like it, but to me the snow is kinda grey, and I think it could be improved to make it pop, but I've played around with the shot and only made it worse, so Im just looking on some sugestions on how to make it better



ISO 100
30 mm
f/11
1/200 sec

[IABoomer]

Not sure what you have for software. In Lightroom I did the following:

- custom white balance on the snowball
- exposure +0.87
- blacks +17
- clarity +20
- vibrance +10

[laughlinc]

I used PSE9 to edit for you. I started with a Levels adjustment layer and pulled the whites up, I also adjust the shadows to brighten it up just a bit more. This took a lot of the warmth out of her skin, so I added a Warming Photo Filter and adjusted the opacity until I liked the look, I then masked out everything but her face since I didn't want the snow to be yellow/orange.

I also thought there was just too much space around her so I adjusted to a square crop and then cloned/healed the fence/grill cover to get rid of the distracting elements. Then I added just a bit of contrast.

[jentenna]

The biggest issue is that it's underexposed, which is why the snow is grey. The white balance is also a little blue. This is easily fixed with basic editing software, and I think it's a really cute shot.

Just for future reference when you're shooting in the snow: your light meter assumes the scene should average out to a middle grey luminence. This means if your shot contains a lot of snow (or any white background), the light meter will "assume" the scene should be darker than it really is and you'll underexpose the shot. Likewise, if you're shooting against a dark background -- say, blacktop -- your light meter will cause you to overexpose by default.

[yulchick]

Originally Posted by IABoomer

Not sure what you have for software. In Lightroom I did the following:

- custom white balance on the snowball
- exposure +0.87
- blacks +17
- clarity +20
- vibrance +10

I also have lightroom, but i guess it takes practice to improve the pictures..

What you did to the picture, to me looks a lil over done, The colors are too saturated, thats kinda what I got after playing around with the picture in lightroom, and wasnt a fan of it. But thanks anyways!

[yulchick]

Originally Posted by laughlinc

I used PSE9 to edit for you. I started with a Levels adjustment layer and pulled the whites up, I also adjust the shadows to brighten it up just a bit more. This took a lot of the warmth out of her skin, so I added a Warming Photo Filter and adjusted the opacity until I liked the look, I then masked out everything but her face since I didn't want the snow to be yellow/orange.

I also thought there was just too much space around her so I adjusted to a square crop and then cloned/healed the fence/grill cover to get rid of the distracting elements. Then I added just a bit of contrast.

I really like how you edited the picture, The snow is white, and all the other colors are just right as well! I will try photoshop instead of lightroom and see if mine comes out that way, or close to it Thanks a lot

And I have a quick question I want to ask while we'r talking about snow pictures.. What do I meter of, when taking shots outside in the snow? The sky, or the snow? I'm really new to DSLRs, got mine like a month ago, and so Im not sure what I need to meter off, to get the right exposure...is there a general rule for metering?

Thanks in advance

[jentenna]

I find that metering off the sky works pretty well in the snow. If it's sunny, just meter on a part of the sky away from the sun. I'll often fine tune a little as I'm shooting. But there's nothing wrong with making small exposure adjustments in post-processing.

[SusanH1970]

Originally Posted by jentenna

The biggest issue is that it's underexposed, which is why the snow is grey. The white balance is also a little blue. This is easily fixed with basic editing software, and I think it's a really cute shot.

Just for future reference when you're shooting in the snow: your light meter assumes the scene should average out to a middle grey luminence. This means if your shot contains a lot of snow (or any white background), the light meter will "assume" the scene should be darker than it really is and you'll underexpose the shot. Likewise, if you're shooting against a dark background -- say, blacktop -- your light meter will cause you to overexpose by default.

+1. Nicely explained!

To do snow portraits, I spot meter off the subject's cheek and ETTR by at least 2/3 stop, sometimes by one full stop.

Fixing this one in post will be tricky because of all the white and bright pink unless you shot in RAW and can adjust from there. Working with a JPG, if you try to bring up the exposure of the whites and midtones of the skin, you'll blow out the red channel in the pink coat.

Example:



EXIF:
Exposure 0.001 sec (1/800)
Aperture f/2.8
Focal Length 50 mm
ISO Speed 100
Shot in manual with spot metering

I spot metered of her cheek and ETTR at +1 stop. In ACR I was able to bring back the few blown highlights. Did a bit more work in CS2, total edit took about 3 minutes.

Hope this helps!

[SusanH1970]

Originally Posted by laughlinc

I used PSE9 to edit for you. I started with a Levels adjustment layer and pulled the whites up, I also adjust the shadows to brighten it up just a bit more. This took a lot of the warmth out of her skin, so I added a Warming Photo Filter and adjusted the opacity until I liked the look, I then masked out everything but her face since I didn't want the snow to be yellow/orange.

I also thought there was just too much space around her so I adjusted to a square crop and then cloned/healed the fence/grill cover to get rid of the distracting elements. Then I added just a bit of contrast.

No offense, it's a really good attempt at a save, but the snow is still blue/grey and the hat/snowball/red channel is blown. That's why trying to do a fix with tricky exposures like this in post is difficult unless you're working with a RAW file. I tried a fix and gave up, lol!

[yulchick]

Originally Posted by SusanH1970

. I tried a fix and gave up, lol!

Hehe, thanks for trying! lol I will shoot in both RAW and JPEG next time, and try to edit the RAWs. Gonna take some time learning as I've never done it before... and I really need to read up on the "terms" and stuff , as I have no Idea what ETTR stands for :P