Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Tips For Taking Pictures In The Snow

Snowhill 

It is a time for snow, though we haven’t had near the amount of snow as last year in our area, we got a good dumping yesterday, and probably one of the last for the year.  Snow can be a real challenge to take pictures in, and to top that off, how do you get a sharp image of your moving subject.  Well, firstly be thankful for digital, because even if your exposure does come out wrong you can still adjust it on your computer before getting them printed, instead of having to rely on whether the lab will simply put your prints through on automatic and not adjust for the snow.

Your camera electronics read differently than the human eye, and in situations like snow, you will often need to trick your camera in order to expose the scene properly.   The two best ways to do this are:

Tips1. focus the red dot on your point and shoot camera on your subject, or a darker area than the snow, this will allow your cameras metering system to meter the darker area rather than the snow.

Tips 2. The second option – Exposure Compensation –this being the much better choice, but understandably, not all camera owners shoot with cameras with this option -  by setting the control to +1(or sometimes more depending on the brightness), it will overexpose the scene by one stop, admitting twice as much light into the photo.

TipsClose up shots are also a great way to get a proper exposure while still allowing the image to display the snowy location in a smaller way.

TipsNext, add some bright colours to your images, this will not only allow for easier metering, but will also pop your pictures.

TipsAnd lastly,  it is best to keep your camera warm, rather than cold/warm/cold/warm, simply due to condensation build up, so try to protect from that situation as much as possible if you are outside for a long period, by keeping your camera inside of your coat.

PS. Thank You Mr. Murray for making our little snow hill ! :)

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