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OK, so the topic title is showing off my French. 
What I really need to know is how to improve back lit shots. I love them and used to always just slightly underexpose when shooting into the sun. recently I got a new camera - a Canon 60D. Now when I do the same I get washed out shots whenever I am even facing the sun. If I shoot in RAW I get an underexposure of say -1.5.
What is the best way to deal with this - use a polariser, use am ND filter, just underexpose more, always shoot in RAW ?
Any suggestions
( here is an example of what I mean...)
Looking at that I would say underexpose more. An ND filter won't do anything that underexposing wouldn't and neither will a polariser (in this particular shot).
Shooting in RAW will give you more leeway than JPEG so I would definitely recommend that. I'm sure your 60D must have decent auto-bracketing, why don't you set if for something like -4 to 0 in 1 stop increments.
Ian
Thanks Ian. The canon does have auto-bracketing so i can give that a try - -3 to 0 would be the maximum on there.
The canon uses CR2 for RAW and I have struggled to get a decent processor for it. I have been using Raw Therapee as that can also be used on Linux, but the results don't come out great.
Any suggestions on that score?
Quote: The canon uses CR2 for RAW and I have struggled to get a decent processor for it. I have been using Raw Therapee as that can also be used on Linux, but the results don't come out great.
Have you tried using Canon's own DPP...it is an excellent RAW program, and of course being Canon, you will have no problems.
malcolm, sarah, thanks for the advice on the Canon DPP. I will definitely give that a go
I think it might have been better in this case to just shoot the shadows. I know backlight can look good, but here it just appears like a white blob. The shadows on the other hand are very nice. In situations such as this I often switch to spot or centre-weighted metering to see what sort of exposure time I have - and I guess that here you had plenty spare. You could have used ND grads but I think it might have been too obvious that you had done so.
Photoshop is probably the best RAW editor, but DPP is pretty good for basic adjustments. Even RAW processing can't do very much with completely blown highlights. There's a variable brush tool in Photoshop, but if the area is too far gone you often just end up with a blotchy mess.
Quote: If I shoot in RAW I get an underexposure of say -1.5
I'm not quite sure what you mean. I would expect to "set" the underexposure, rather than "get" it. What mode are you shooting in? (Av, Tv, M, Auto, etc).
It's still possible to correct the result even in jpg - I've taken the liberty of adjusting the brightness - hope you don't mind!
Penarth Pier?
Graham, Thanks for that. I did try this myself and got this result.
Not what I envisaged when I took the shot.
You are dead right about the location - Penarth Pier. I took a walk there to get some inspiration - generally it worked, but not on these back lit shots though
fwiw Peter (nice p.f btw) I use this approach for c.j images.
1. Set the cam to single point autofocus.
2. Set to spot metering.
3. If you're using a zoom lens, zoom into that part of the image where the edges are best showing the c.j effect , half depress the shutter and lock that exposure.
4. Zoom back out , recompose the scene and shoot.
Heres a kak example of some street in the same light , zoomed the hairy bloke and the metering did a fair job on the rest of the scene.
The simplest and quickest way is to simply dial in some compensation, piddling around with spot metering is going to be slow for quick grab shots but it is still another way.
Here`s an example similar to yours, I dialled in some comp, but with very strong back lighting your always going to loose something.
http://www.ephotozine.com/user/paul-morgan-599/gallery/photo/---20014337
And the same here, just dialled in some comp.
http://www.ephotozine.com/user/paul-morgan-599/gallery/photo/---20163036
http://www.ephotozine.com/user/paul-morgan-599/gallery/photo/---20126344
Quote:
You are dead right about the location - Penarth Pier. I took a walk there to get some inspiration - generally it worked, but not on these back lit shots though
Bonvilston _ I knew I knew that name. I used to live in Llandow, near Cowbridge. Now live in Carmarthen, which is near nowhere! I know Penarth well - and so does my wife from her yewth.
Hey Rob , I spent a while living in a caravan on a site near the karting circuit at Llandow whilst waiting to sell a house. We could have been neighbours !
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