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XT-4 loses detail in bright light situations

Fastmc

By Fastmc
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Fastmc Rookie

Fastmc

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Thank you so much your insight. They are truly educational to me. 
 

I have another question if you would indulge me:

When shooting the face of a mountain that is mostly rocky and under bright sun. The rock face became overexposed as to lose details. What exposure mode will you recommend?

 

In addition, what exposure mode do you recommend to capture details of a snowcapped mountain? 

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jerryy Veteran

jerryy

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You folks are making this way more complicated than it needs to be.

"When I shoot a mountain with a rock face under bright sun, XT-4 tends to lose details of the rock structure ...".

This means your subject is over-exposed due to the camera settings. Go back to the basics.

Try using the camera in manual mode. Set the ISO to the lowest native speed (ISO 160 on the X-T4), set the f-stop to around f14, at least f8, maybe f16 depending the lens. Take a shot at a shutter speed you find comfortable depending on whether or not you have a tripod handy. But before taking the shot, look at the histogram --- you turn this on in the display settings and make sure the graph is not slammed over to the right, adjust the shutter speed to keep the peak over to the other side, but do not slam the graph to the left-hand side either. The display options also have something called "highlight warning" to tell you if you are going to blow out the highlights, use it as well.

Take a look at the shot. if you have too much areas still being blown out, you have options:

1.) Lower the ISO into the Low settings, or turn on the electronic shutter and crank the speed up. These can be very useful, but test them first to make sure the results are to your liking, some folks think the resulting look is "digital rather than film-like"; you may not mind it or even see the effect.

2,) If that does not work try using a ND (neutral density) filter on the lens. Those threads on the end of the lens are there specially for attaching the right size round ones, there are other attaching options as well. This method has been the go-to approach since the film days.

CP filters have their place and work in a pinch, but if you are trying to get a panorama, part of the sky is often darker than other parts because of how the filter works.

The other tools you are discussing have their place but they are not a substitute for getting the first frame as well as can be gotten.

if you find the dark part is a little too dark, but the highlights are okay, the dark part can be lifted in your image editing program.

 

 

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jerryy Veteran

jerryy

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1 minute ago, Fastmc said:

Jerry, Thank you for your eye-opening advices. How many stops of ND filter do you suggest for the rock face and snowcapped mountain situations? 

I wish there was an easy answer for that one, but that does depend on the the time of day, the season of the year (really!), how overcast the sky is in various directions, etc.

Usually, folks carry several different grades up to and including something similar to one called the 'Big Stopper' which is really dark. If you are wanting a ND filter, read reviews carefully to make sure there is no color cast from the filter, these slip out from time to time because of manufacturing practices.

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Herco Rising Star

Herco

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8 hours ago, Fastmc said:

Jerry, Thank you for your eye-opening advices. How many stops of ND filter do you suggest for the rock face and snowcapped mountain situations? 

You could opt for a variable ND filter that allows you to determine the amount of reduction of light by rotating the filter. It saves on the number of ND filters you have to buy. However, the cheaper variable ND filters tend to suffer a bit more from purple color cast, so make sure you buy a really good one. In my experience the ones from B+W, Hoya and Cokin are very good.

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