Want to get consistent great exposure?
Some say you need an agent,
but all you really need to do
is look at the mountains.
Isn't it pretty?
Yep, that's right.
Just a quick glance at the mountains and you'll
have all the information you need.
Come on.
Hi Eric from Canon USA here, and welcome to the
next episode of Quick Tips.
Today will be looking at those mountains as a
means to figure out how to get great exposure from
your digital camera.
So you may ask,
"Eric, how's that work?"
Well, it's all about a tool in your camera
called the histogram.
Now, histogram right?
Sounds complicated.
It's not as bad as it sounds.
Some say,
"histogram shim-istogram, who needs it?
My exposures are fine."
Sure about that?
Histogram might even sound like something you go to
your doctor about because it kind of looks like an EKG.
The histogram is nothing more than a graphical representation
of the tonal values in any given picture,
and they kind of look like this.
The graph reveals a range of tones that exist in your image.
Let's just forget about color for a moment
and pretend you're taking a black and white photo.
Everything on the far left side of the graph
represents dark tones.
Everything on the right, your lighter tones,
and of course you guessed it,
the midtones lay right there in the middle where
you would expect them.
The relative height of these mountains is irrelevant,
it just means that the higher the mountains are,
the more pixels there are at that particular tone.
If I accidentally over exposed an image meaning too bright,
you might see the histogram data extend beyond the right side of the graph.
In simplest terms,
it's basically a warning saying that I'm losing printable detail
in highlights, and those mountains that extend
beyond the right side will be pure white without detail.
There's another cool tool in the blue Playback menu called "Highlight Alert"
AKA the Blinkies.
Now, this tool alerts you of any potential blowout
of exposure by blinking in the affected areas
when you're reviewing your image.
On the opposite side of the histogram
in another example, if I underexpose an image to
the point where the data extends beyond the
left side of the graph, the image is losing
printable detail in the deep shadow areas.
It's within these areas you'll likely see a phenomenon called
digital noise.
It looks like Sandy grit in your photograph and is a
tell-tale sign your images underexposed or two dark.
It's one of the major areas digital noise lives.
One misnomer I'd like to clear up right now,
Is that histogram should extend from one side of
the graph all the way to the other.
If your histogram looks like that,
it simply means your image has a
wide range of tones from highlig midtones and shadows,
and it kind of looks like the one you see here.
Now, let's take a look at this picture of an
egg against a white background.
All the tones are on the lighter side,
so the mountains will appear on the right side of the graph.
This is completely normal and you'll see
the exact opposite when I painted the egg black against,
And put it against a black background,
all the tones will be on the opposite side.
To see how histograms react in real time, turn your
live view LCD screen on and touch the info button
until you see the live histogram appear on the overlay of the scene.
As you change exposure, you'll see the data move
to the right, if you add more exposure and to the left
if you decrease your exposure.
So we now know that dark tones should appear towards
the left side of the graph.
If you see them creeping towards the middle,
there's a good chance you're over exposing the scene,
so you may simply want to decrease
the exposure and watch the data that histogram shift
back to the left where it should be.
The same exercise can be done for the highlights,
but remember to keep the data or the tones from falling off
the right side of the graph so you don't lose that printable detail.
To review the histogram for each photo, touch the play button.
That's the blue triangle button on the back of your camera
and you'll see as you push the nfo button, you'll see the
histogram appear for that individual image.
Occasionally in a high contrast environment
like a sunny day, you may have very bright or dark objects in
your photo, which may cause the histogram data to extend beyond
One side or the other of the graph.
You have to determine whether those tones are
important to you or not.
An example would be the sun.
Under normal circumstances, you're never going to
get detail on the sun, it's simply too bright.
So, that small spike where the sun would be is likely going to
extend beyond over to the right side of the graph,
where you can see it.
Histograms are a great way to get reliable exposure
information, but because LCD displays vary slightly
from camera to camera,
it's best not to rely on them alone to gauge your
exposure accuracy.
At the end of the day, histogram are the best way to
warn you of potential exposure issues.
So if you want to up your game, start looking at your histogram
and you'll be well on your way to getting great exposure.
Hopefully this clears up any confusion you may have
had about histograms, but if you have any questions or comments,
please leave them below and we'll do our best to
get back to you.
Aren't you glad you didn't have to go see your doctor
about that histogram?
Until next time get out there, start practicing, and
stay tuned for more quick tips in this series right here.
So long everybody.