victorian locksmiths

[keithd]

Another shot from Blist hill any advice on this appreciated. Brilliant sunshine whole room white washed. How do you set up on a day like this.

[Stan]

Re: victorian locksmiths

that's quite an interesting scene and quite difficult with the light

assuming you shot RAW and use photoshop, if you open the RAW shot in ACR, the first thing to try is selecting the white balance tool and clicking on an area that should be white

Another alternative would be to make 3 exposures with -1 and +1 exposure compensation either side and blend them together with HDR

[Tigger]

Re: victorian locksmiths

agree with the bracket - it would expose for outside and the shadows inside, but I presume you can't return .. Working on the assumption of Stans you could lift the shadows a lot and that would bring more detail into the room

also direct uploads never show your work well here, try using flickr

[lunarbo]

Re: victorian locksmiths

Bracketing/HDR is one solution, but perhaps more for the experienced photographers as Stan and Tigger above.

Your question was "how do you set up for a day like this"
Well you set up for what's important-the inside of the room -and accept that the greenery might get a bit blown. Would stepping 2 steps to the left have given you less length of window?
When you're happy with the composition Use AE lock and check your WB so the colours are how you want. The shot isn't going anywhere so you can do lots and review on the screen til it's about right

Then if you've shot in RAW you've got the knowledge that a little tweak of highlights and shadows can be performed later

[AlexR!]

Re: victorian locksmiths

Keith, you've done a decent job in a tricky situation. Regarding the set up, I have programmed my default settings for a shot like that as Custom function 1 so I don't need to think about it. This is +/-2 bracketed exposure and high speed burst to minimise movement when hand held. I then process in HDR. If you don't want to take HDR then as the others have said, you can still do quite a lot to the RAW file.
Positioning wise, Bo is absolutely right about minimising the window if you know it is going to blow if you want to expose for the interior, but I like the contrast of the very gritty interior and the greenery outside. The problem for me is that the darkness stops you seeing the detail and therefore there is no real focus beyond 'it is a cluttered workshop' (which is fine if that is what you wanted to show) but ideally I want to look around and see where the pulleys connect in the ceiling but these are lost, and I want to distinguish the different tools on the bench but I can't. So, I would suggest you either choose a detail to focus on, perhaps guiding the viewer's eyes with a vignette, or make the whole room more visible.
Hope that helps.

[keithd]

Re: victorian locksmiths

Thanks everyone its good to know your here. Will try differant tac with shot in library

[Jonathan Teatime]

Re: victorian locksmiths

Given that you only have the one RAW image you could try a One Shot HDR approach