snow shots advice

[Jonny1*2]

Hi all,

Went to Chill Factor in Manchester yesterday to test out the D40 on my mate snow boarding. If anyone has been, the lighting isn't great in there and when i adjusted the shutter speed to around 150 the photo's were very dark. So i adjusted the ISO from 200 to 400,800 and a few on 1600 (picture noise was pretty poor). I tried reducing the speed, but this made pics even more blurry. I even tried adjusting the exposure to help, but no joy.

I would post some of them up, but they are pretty poor imo. Not one was shape, so i was a bit gutted as i was freezing my balls off for no gains. The only thing i didn't try was adjusting the white ballance.

Any advice welcome

 

[planetx]

you sound like you tried most options tbh.

s/sped 150th - Fno???

iso 1600.

apart from using some flashguns or a better camera indoors is always going to be hard, especially with moving action etc.

Have you thought about panning the subjects rather than trying to freeze movement???
Sometimes with action/extreme sports enhanced movement can add to the atmosphere.


This situation is exactly why Nikon designed the D3.

oh and white balance will have no effect on exposure.

 

[Ian]

EDIT: I'm not sure I read your post correctly and planetx is better qualified to answer your question!




Do you get any funny looks when you take your camera in there? I really want to try a few shots, but I don't really know anyone that goes on the slopes lol!

There are a few things you can do. If you use spot metering and take the reading off your mate snowboarding, then he will come out well exposed, although you may find the snow is blown. This is to do with the range of light sources being too great for the range that your camera is capable of recording (imagine snow is white and your mate is extremely dark in comparison - completely different ends of the scale). This is often the case and there is not a lot you can do about it.

If you are taking a general photo of the snow you need to over-expose your photo. The photo won't come out over-exposed, but as there is so much light in the photo your camera will think it is.

Once you have compensated for the conditions, then you can tweak the aperture/shutter/ISO combination to give the shot you're after; as long as you maintain the exposure level.

Let me know next time you go?

 

[Jonny1*2]

Thanks guys. Not sure what you mean about panning? Presume you mean following the subject rather than being still?

Was a bit gutted. This was the best i managed all day;

Not great really. Plus that's slightly edited.

s/speed was 150 yeah. anything less and it was crap. tried it with flash, in auto and still no luck.

Ian, didn't get any funny looks no. Was there with some friends, but i wouldn't see any reason why you couldn't go just to get some shots. If you go upstairs to 'Chillis' bar you can go out onto the viewing gallery and shoot from there. FYI take some gloves and a jacket. It's -2 in there and believe me it gets a wee nippy. When i went from the viewing gallery to the bar the filter condensed up.lol

 

[Golgarth]

what f stop are you running? basic rules apply, low f stop, higher ISO = faster shutter speeds in lower lights

 

[Ian]

Ian, didn't get any funny looks no. Was there with some friends, but i wouldn't see any reason why you couldn't go just to get some shots. If you go upstairs to 'Chillis' bar you can go out onto the viewing gallery and shoot from there. FYI take some gloves and a jacket. It's -2 in there and believe me it gets a wee nippy. When i went from the viewing gallery to the bar the filter condensed up.lol

Lol cheers dude, if you're going there again I'm only round the corner so I'll call by if you like, see if I can suggest anything. If you shoot Canon you can try out the 70-200mm, you'll probably find that the more zoomed in on the subject you are the easier it is to get a decent shot, as the camera can meter more easily. That's if you're using the kit lens at the moment?

A few things to consider are the fact that there are most probably frozen particles in the air, which means you'll effectively be shooting through a light mist. Also, as planetx says, it might be easier to pan the subject (follow it as you're taking the shot) so that if you're struggling for shutter speed at least the subject should stay in focus.

Might be worth having a word with Riad as well, I know he goes there quite a lot, both skiing and with his camera.

 

[Jungle_Jim]

the reason why your pics are dark mate is the cameras metering gets fooled by large amount of white in the image and therefore stops down the camera to compensate. You will therefore need adjust the exposure value to counteract this, so EV +1 etc. The proper way to deal with this is to use an 18% grey card to make sure you are exposing it correctly but its easy enough just to overexposed the image by +1 stop or whatever amount is needed.

hope that helps
James

 

[Jonny1*2]

what f stop are you running? basic rules apply, low f stop, higher ISO = faster shutter speeds in lower lights

I was using a 55-200mm nikkor vr lense, s0 f4- f5.6

Lol cheers dude, if you're going there again I'm only round the corner so I'll call by if you like, see if I can suggest anything. If you shoot Canon you can try out the 70-200mm, you'll probably find that the more zoomed in on the subject you are the easier it is to get a decent shot, as the camera can meter more easily. That's if you're using the kit lens at the moment?

A few things to consider are the fact that there are most probably frozen particles in the air, which means you'll effectively be shooting through a light mist. Also, as planetx says, it might be easier to pan the subject (follow it as you're taking the shot) so that if you're struggling for shutter speed at least the subject should stay in focus.

Might be worth having a word with Riad as well, I know he goes there quite a lot, both skiing and with his camera.

Panning isn't very easy from where i was standing really. Particle idea sounds interesting.

the reason why your pics are dark mate is the cameras metering gets fooled by large amount of white in the image and therefore stops down the camera to compensate. You will therefore need adjust the exposure value to counteract this, so EV +1 etc. The proper way to deal with this is to use an 18% grey card to make sure you are exposing it correctly but its easy enough just to overexposed the image by +1 stop or whatever amount is needed.

hope that helps
James

Not sure what you mean about the grey card :S, but i did try exposure, but saying that i can't remember what the ISO was on at the time.

 

[Gaz.]

A grey card allows you to expose correctly. The white of the snow will have thrown the exposure meter off.

TBH though, D40's are s**t for noise above ISO 400, and crap in low light. Wish I could buy something better personally.