Walking Snowy (and a few points abot exposure)

[arash_hazeghi]

Here is a walking snowy going after Avocets to kick some a** after successfully dodging an incoming Avocet aiming for the head :D

Egrets are painted absolutely white so camera's standard meter will blow up the red channel, this is why egrets often look like a large white blob with sharp outlines and beak but very little texture. They do have lots of feather texture and fine gradations in the white tones!!! In order to preserve this subtle detail you need to either use manual exposure or dial in compensation for these beauties in Tv and Av modes "Expose to the right does NOT apply to egrets* For large pixel cameras choose -1/2 to -2/3 EV and for cropped bodies use -1 to -1 1/3 EV in direct warm light to retain the red channel information, since there are no dark feathers noise is not an issue.

Here is an example, notice the detail in the whites, hot afternoon light



5D MKII 500 f/4 at f/5.6 ISO 400 1/4000 sec (meter - 2/3 EV) sw: DPP

Comments welcomed.

[Bob Decker]

Thanks for the tip, Arash. Enjoy the image as well. Definately can see some nice detail in the feathers.

[Nick Palmieri]

Thank Arash for the info. Can you explain why the red channels get blown in these situations? Also I assume that is if you are using a matrix metering pattern?? If you are spot metering on the bird, do you still want to add exposure? The detail in this guy looks great, just a little confused about the rational. Thanks.

[Dave Mills]

Hi Arash, Beautiful job on exposure. Appears shot in warm light as opposed to midday.Comp is good along with a nicely muted backround. Well handled!

[Nicki Gwynn Jones]

Arash, very nicely handled whites and thank you for the explanation.
I love it when snowies kick a*** :D
Best,
Nicki

[arash_hazeghi]

Thank Arash for the info. Can you explain why the red channels get blown in these situations? Also I assume that is if you are using a matrix metering pattern?? If you are spot metering on the bird, do you still want to add exposure? The detail in this guy looks great, just a little confused about the rational. Thanks.

Yes Nick, I never use spot meter, if you use spot meter you are fine. plus I subtract exposure not add :)

[Bill Dix]

Arash - Great pose, eye contact, background. Wonderful detail in the whites. Thanks for the instructional tip.

[Lance Peters]

Thank Arash for the info. Can you explain why the red channels get blown in these situations? Also I assume that is if you are using a matrix metering pattern?? If you are spot metering on the bird, do you still want to add exposure? The detail in this guy looks great, just a little confused about the rational. Thanks.

Hi Nick - not sure why you would want to use spot metering???
IMHO - very limited applications in bird photography - it can be done - but much easier to use matrix or the canon equivalent.
Spot requires some understanding of the zone system - there is a good video by photoshop cafe.


Arash - exposure rocks - Pose rocks.
Good one!!

[Peter Farrell]

Gorgeous image. Such excellent detail in the whites. Thanks for the tip.
Peter

[WIlliam Maroldo]

I'm a bit confused as well, and it seems likely that detail here was brought made more apparent due to the 1/4000sec, but most likely the angle the light source hit the bird.
Exposing to the right refers to shifting the histogram to the right, and not clipping the highlights, which includes the red channel. Although loss of detail in white birds will occur due to blowing channels, it can happen even if the exposure is correct.
The biggest problem is light direction; if the light hits the white feathers head on, as opposed to a slight angle, the very small shadows that add contrast to the pure white feathers are not there, and what appears is white and has no detail. The white is not clipped. This becomes very evident in flight captures, where a wing orientation is perpendicular to the light source(there is no angle needed to create the necessary shadows), and the rest of the bird has suitable detail. regards~Bill

[Michael Gerald-Yamasaki]

Arash,

Greetings. Great feather detail... you have a brightness range of 12% across the whites (not including shadows) which really emphasizes the detail. Compare, for instance, to the recent Nicki Gwynn Jones Supermodel shot at 1% across the neck (which has good, but subtle detail), where a judicious curve adjustment could bring this up to 3-4%. (I use the dropper tool with Color Picker to get these estimates of brightness ranges)

While I agree that a lower exposure gets the broader brightness range while a more aggressive ettr would not, I think the red channel clipping is specific to the warm lighting here. That is to say, the lower exposure would benefit the brightness range even in cooler light.

Thanks for the tip...

Cheers,

-Michael-

[arash_hazeghi]

I'm a bit confused as well, and it seems likely that detail here was brought made more apparent due to the 1/4000sec, but most likely the angle the light source hit the bird.
Exposing to the right refers to shifting the histogram to the right, and not clipping the highlights, which includes the red channel. Although loss of detail in white birds will occur due to blowing channels, it can happen even if the exposure is correct.
The biggest problem is light direction; if the light hits the white feathers head on, as opposed to a slight angle, the very small shadows that add contrast to the pure white feathers are not there, and what appears is white and has no detail. The white is not clipped. This becomes very evident in flight captures, where a wing orientation is perpendicular to the light source(there is no angle needed to create the necessary shadows), and the rest of the bird has suitable detail. regards~Bill

Bill,
Even 1/1000 sec is enough to freeze an egret, don't need 1/4000 at all. even in flight!!! If you expose to the right here, red channel will be clipped, which means red pixels will be saturated, and you cannot recover details no matter how high fast the shutter speed.

The contrast in feathers here are not due to any shadows, it is just the tones present in the white feathers. You can get these tones even if light is coming from above, again if exposure is correct. Of course afternoon light has better angle in terms of eliminating harsh shadows.

Egret, harsh light coming from above, photo taken at around 1PM. meter -1EV.




This is an example with camera standard meter, red channel saturated and clipped, no details in whites. So don't do this.

[arash_hazeghi]

Mike with a white bird and in any light, the red channel will be clipped first if you are not careful, of course afternoon light can exaggerate this.

Arash,

Greetings. Great feather detail... you have a brightness range of 12% across the whites (not including shadows) which really emphasizes the detail. Compare, for instance, to the recent Nicki Gwynn Jones Supermodel shot at 1% across the neck (which has good, but subtle detail), where a judicious curve adjustment could bring this up to 3-4%. (I use the dropper tool with Color Picker to get these estimates of brightness ranges)

While I agree that a lower exposure gets the broader brightness range while a more aggressive ettr would not, I think the red channel clipping is specific to the warm lighting here. That is to say, the lower exposure would benefit the brightness range even in cooler light.

Thanks for the tip...

Cheers,

-Michael-

[Michael Gerald-Yamasaki]

Arash,

Hmmm. This may enter the domain of wb and differing sensors, but there are whites that have more blue (240, 240, 245 rgb for instance) for these the blue channel will clip first. Perhaps, most bird feather white is on the yellow-orange end of the hue spectrum (ssems true of egrets), in which case, you're quite right about red clipping first.

Cheers,

-Michael-

[arash_hazeghi]

Arash,

Hmmm. This may enter the domain of wb and differing sensors, but there are whites that have more blue (240, 240, 245 rgb for instance) for these the blue channel will clip first. Perhaps, most bird feather white is on the yellow-orange end of the hue spectrum (ssems true of egrets), in which case, you're quite right about red clipping first.

Cheers,

-Michael-

Mike,

It is possible to have blue channel blown too, but I have never seen it in my bird photographs. Although I would say a difference of 5 is just a WB issue.
Also image sensor has almost linear response, the tone curve that is applied to RAW data is not and flattens out near the saturation level, so practically values of more than 240-245 are almost saturated any way. CMOS sensor is natively very absorbent in red and IR spectrum, the IR cut off filter takes care of most but not all, in normal conditions, atmosphere acts as IR reflector, especially if you have clouds, so red channel is most vulnerable when you have white subject.


Best,

[Michael Gerald-Yamasaki]

It is possible to have blue channel blown too, but I have never seen it in my bird photographs.

Arash,

Ah, by chance Milt Berko posted (you commented there) Breeding Egret in Habitat with blue channel blown most (then green then red) in cool lighting.

Don't get me wrong, I agree red is the most challenging channel here, but there are occasions...

Cheers,

-Michael-