Taking skiing pics with an SLR - aperture/shutter question

Morning all,

I'm off to Cham for a few days and have my first ever SLR to take with me,
Canon EOS 300d.

Now I've read various things about the snow looking grey etc unless I get
my settings right.

Can anyone recommend some basic aperture/shutter speeds to start off with?
It looks like I cannot manually over/under expose using the EOS 300d in
manual mode!

cheers,

Greg

Can anyone recommend some basic aperture/shutter speeds to start off with?
It looks like I cannot manually over/under expose using the EOS 300d in
manual mode!

I'd be utterly gobsmacked if ANY SLR let alone the outstanding 300D would
prevent you either over OR under-exposing in manual mode! That's the whole
point of manual mode - you take over EVERYTHING. A simple too-long exposure
in bright light and your shot will look like a snow hare covered in tippex
during a blizzard...

I took some snow shots with my SLR a year ago and found that in the bright
reflective light I had to use fast shutter speeds (ie less than 1/250 sec)
or it overexposed. I could, of course, have fiddled with white balance etc
if I'd wanted to, but this was on default settings for everything. I
experimented with 1/10000th sec shots almost directly into the sun, but even
this was't quick enough to stop a complete "sun crucifix" over-exposure.

However, I'm not a photographic expert, but can provide you with an easy
link to those that are at
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/forum.asp?forum=1031 These guys are great
and friendly and will help you massively. Remember to have a quick "search"
on the forum first though or you may get hit with ruthless sarcasm.

"Greg Hilton" wrote in message
...
Morning all,

I'm off to Cham for a few days and have my first ever SLR to take with me,
Canon EOS 300d.

Now I've read various things about the snow looking grey etc unless I get
my settings right.

Can anyone recommend some basic aperture/shutter speeds to start off with?
It looks like I cannot manually over/under expose using the EOS 300d in
manual mode!

I'm sure you will find you can set in any exposure you choose, but the
answer depends on a number of factors including how sunny it is, time of
day, etc etc. To get the best from any SLR you really need to read a few
basic photography books, which any decent library will have, and this isn't
the forum to go further into that. Digital SLRs are no exception (though
you are spared all the stuff about negative versus transparency film).

The specific question you ask about snow looking grey can be answered in
general terms. Reflectance exposure meters (such as the one within your
SLR) assume that the scene has a reflectivity of about 18% and will expose
that as a medium grey tone (you can buy a card to simulate this).

Since snow reflects, say, 90% of light, that's about two stops [1] more than
18% so (perhaps counter-intuitively) you'll need to overexpose your picture
by that amount in order to get the snow to look white, assuming that the
scene is mainly snow, and not a close-up of someone's black ski-jacket! So,
if the meter suggests an aperture of f11 for your chosen shutter speed,
you'd need to open up to f5.6. Alternatively, leave it at f11 and slow the
shutter (increase the period) by two steps (eg 1/125 to 1/32). Or any
reciprocal combination : naturally, you'll be taking into account the other
effects this change will have, such as on depth of field or sharpness of
movement.

Different cameras' exposure meters can look at different portions of the
scene, so be wary of this; and some try to be clever by making assumptions
about the composition (contrast ratio, etc). If in doubt, and you are
really struggling to make sense of the meter readings, a deep blue Alpine
sky has a reflectance near enough to 18% not to matter, and of course you
can to some extent tweak the results on your PC afterwards.

HTH, have a good trip,

Steve

[1] If you are not clear about 'stops' then you really should read up on it!

A little tip form an old Pro photographer is to take a reading of the back
of your hand in the light that the subject is in
In general the skin on th back of the hand has about 18% reflectance. Look
what the camera is trying or telling you to set it at and set it manually.
This will most times give a very good reading especially for print film or
digital pics. For transparancy work you do need to be much more accurate.
Print and digital can be adjusted when making the final print

Greg Hilton wrote:

Can anyone recommend some basic aperture/shutter speeds to start off with?


Just open up one F-stop extra, perhaps two on really sunny days. Sun on
snow plays merry hell with light meters, and if you don't do this, then
every pic will show the snow in perfect definition, with every ski trace
visible, and everybody on it will look like black blobs.

For (relative) close-ups, forget opening up a stop and use fill-in
flash.


--
Trophy 1200 (Doctored) 750SS CB400F CD200 ST70 DT50MX
GAGARPHOF#30 GHPOTHUF#1 BOTAFOT#60 ANORAK#06 YTC#3
BOF#30 WUSS#5 The bells, the bells.....

Greg Hilton wrote:
Morning all,

I'm off to Cham for a few days and have my first ever SLR to take with me,
Canon EOS 300d.

Now I've read various things about the snow looking grey etc unless I get
my settings right.

Can anyone recommend some basic aperture/shutter speeds to start off with?
It looks like I cannot manually over/under expose using the EOS 300d in
manual mode!


It's already been said by others, but to re-iterate I either take a
reading off the back of my hand, or if it's too cold I just open up the
aperture a couple of stops (or slow down the shutter if I want to keep
the depth of field). I've never used a Canon, but it can't be that
differnt to a Nikon, and adjustments like these are very easy to do. So
easy I can't even tell you what I do, I "just do it" when the camera is
in my hand. You can't really recommend a sutter speed/ aperture
combination because that will depend on your film speed (or the setting
on the digi which corresponds to film speed) and the prevailing light.
On a bright day you could easily be on the tightest apperture and a
speed of 1/500th, but on an overcast day you might be down several stops
from there.

If you get it a bit wrong it's not the end of the world, you should be
able to make up for being one or 2 stops out using Photoshop or similar,
and if you get prints made at a decent shop (like Snappy Snaps) they too
can compensate for you to a certain extent.

The simple answer to this is that manual exposure just allows you to get a
reading off one thing - most conveniently a flesh-tone, like the back of
your hand - to give you a more typical piece of landscape than the almost
pure white snow you'll have in front of your camera. You could also use the
exposure lock facility, if you have one, to do this.

I've shot ski/snow images professionally for years using colour transparency
materials, which did indeed mean lots of bracketing to ensure results - but
then I moved to digital, and life is MUCH easier.

First I took back-up shots, using a Nikon Coolpix 995, which was not only
small enough to slip into my ski jacket pocket, but showed that digital
really could do a decent job of coping with snowscapes, with later tweaking
in Photoshop to compensate for any underexposure.

Recently I got a D70, and immediately found the confidence to shoot a major
ski piece using digital only, for the first time - the matrix metering does
a superb job of exposure, even in snow. A polarizer improved things still
further.

So, shoot with your digital, view the results immediately and if you feel
they need exposure adjustment, do so and re-shoot. That's all there is to
it. Auto-bracket if you wish. Shoot at highest quality/largest image size,
and if you can save in RAW format, then better still - digital means you can
fine-tune your images when you get back to base. Know the sharpest aperture
setting for your lens and use it, adjusting the speed either manually or on
aperture-priority.

Now go and amaze yourself... and don't forget to enjoy your skiing!

RM


"Greg Hilton" wrote in message
...
Morning all,

I'm off to Cham for a few days and have my first ever SLR to take with me,
Canon EOS 300d.

Now I've read various things about the snow looking grey etc unless I get
my settings right.

Can anyone recommend some basic aperture/shutter speeds to start off with?
It looks like I cannot manually over/under expose using the EOS 300d in
manual mode!

cheers,

Greg

Thanks all, I'll try exposing off the back of my hand, sounds like a good
trick!


I also have a Digital Ixus point and shoot, which I can just keep in an
inside pocket and grab quickly, I'm not sure the extra effort of the SLR
will give me better pics???

regards,

Greg

Greg Hilton wrote:

I'm not sure the extra effort of the SLR
will give me better pics???


Yes, it will, in many cases.


--
Trophy 1200 (Doctored) 750SS CB400F CD200 ST70 DT50MX
GAGARPHOF#30 GHPOTHUF#1 BOTAFOT#60 ANORAK#06 YTC#3
BOF#30 WUSS#5 The bells, the bells.....

Greg Hilton wrote:

I'm off to Cham for a few days and have my first ever SLR to take with me,
Canon EOS 300d.

Now I've read various things about the snow looking grey etc unless I get
my settings right.

Can anyone recommend some basic aperture/shutter speeds to start off with?
It looks like I cannot manually over/under expose using the EOS 300d in
manual mode!


If you remain with a viewfinder camera and a lightmeter you do not
get these problems.

As others have suggested, if you are photographing a group of people,
take a skin tone, which will give you the correct exposure for faces.
But just as you cannot photograph black people and white people
together with any success, taking photographs of snow and snow texture
requires taking readings from the snow. And perhaps some bracketing.

Perhaps some slower film, 22 DIN, if you are not taking 'party' shots
by flash at night.