Should I just wait 'til summer?

[AesBreCov]

Ok, so I switched my camera to completely manual today...except focus, cuz I still don't move as fast as a 2yr old! So, anywho - We got a bunch of snow last night and today, so thought I'd try it out....I don't know what to do! I guess I'm not understanding things as well as I thought, cuz I can't seem to get the settings right - if it looks right on my son, the snow doesn't look right....if it looks right on the snow, you can hardly see my son's face!

Here's an idea of what I got - any suggestions on what I should do with the settings are greatly appreciated! Obviously the snow in front of his face is distracting, because the wind started really blowing, so I'd have to speed up the shutter, but then how should I set the aperture?
I don't know much about editing, either, so I haven't done anything to it - I haven't even played with the crop yet:



ISO 200
1/100
F14
55mm

Snow is difficult! I wonder if I should wait until summer to figure out my camera!

[IABoomer]

You're running into the difference between what the human eye can distinguish in dynamic range (difference from darkest to lightest) and what even the best modern camera sensors can record.

Your eye balances things out where you can see the detail of the snow and the highlights of your child's face. The camera can't do that, so you get what you described; blown out snow, or a dark kid.

You can even out the light by exposing for the snow and using fill flash or a reflector to get light on your child's face (probably a flash since you're chasing a fast kid). If you're shooting RAW, you might be able to do some post processing where you can create two images, one with the child exposed properly and one with the snow detail available and blend them together.

As a quick and dirty example, I took your original image, created a second copy adjusted for the snow, and blended them in Photoshop using a layer mask.



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[NicoleScraps]

Snow + child is a very difficult thing to get right. Good advice above. I've seen quite a few threads in the forums talking about doing portraits in snow. Maybe trying using the search option at the top and read up on them.
Cute boy though !

[AesBreCov]

Thanks for the advice! I guess I'm gonna have to actually learn photoshop now

[kristenh]

take this advice fwiw given that i'm a newb and haven't really learned how to expose for this or expose for that- in the snow, i set my exposure compensation up +1 from where i usually have it (+2/3 is where i usually keep it b/c i'm shooting raw and b/c my partic camera just seems to underexpose). that usually results in nice white snow and reasonably well exposed kids. you'd probably want to experiment with yours- mine's a nikon d5000.

but let me tell you i am looooonging for spring. yeesh, enough wtih the snow already

[AesBreCov]

Originally Posted by kristenh

take this advice fwiw given that i'm a newb and haven't really learned how to expose for this or expose for that- in the snow, i set my exposure compensation up +1 from where i usually have it (+2/3 is where i usually keep it b/c i'm shooting raw and b/c my partic camera just seems to underexpose). that usually results in nice white snow and reasonably well exposed kids. you'd probably want to experiment with yours- mine's a nikon d5000.

but let me tell you i am looooonging for spring. yeesh, enough wtih the snow already

Thanks...I will try that, too.....if we get back out before it melts! This is only our third snow - the first melted before 11am on the first day, It was way too cold to go out in the second, and this was just perfect! I have a few pics I really LOVE that I took in the summertime, and I feel I didn't have to try as hard, so I definitely look forward to taking pics this spring, too!