Skip to main content

in reply to Neil E. Hodges

that's over exposure; add a polarizing filter to your lenses for the reflection and stop down a few notches if necessary. On such a bright day you should have plenty of light either way!
in reply to Neil E. Hodges

yah, assuming it actually is over exposed it means the information was lost; you may be able to get some detail back if you shot in raw and there's anything there that's just hard to see and not actually overexposed
in reply to Sam Whited

Sadly, this is the RAW, and those parts are overexposed in it.
in reply to Neil E. Hodges

Usually my recipe in those situations. shoot raw. check the histogram in playback. Dial down the exposure (highlights blown off are mostly NOT to recover..) and raise the depts after then...

Well the water stream "live with this" because water flow tends to get white/overblown compared to the near landscape (speed ...)

But with the sky blown off. Maybe mask the blown off parts and try to dial down (Exposure -2 as first try).

Last thing: Which camera was used? Mobile phone? No chance then.
With that said, have the same problem sometimes (dark forest and sundown above...) and have a FX camera does help but really not so much.
in reply to dieter_wilhelm

Thanks for all the insight. I've tried cranking down the exposure of parts like this, but it just turns into a grey or black void.

I'm shooting with a mirror less camera and it does have a histogram view, so I'll check that out when I'm shooting photos next.
in reply to Neil E. Hodges

Mirrorless suggests a late model camera. Set it to shoot 5-shot exposure brackets as a default. In post, simply discard shots like that above and select 3 (even 2) best of remainder to blend as HDR (an easy process). As a bonus, you will most often find one of the bracket shots that needs no further processing, you will miss very few field shots and you will more rapidly learn what works and why. Rinse and repeat until you become comfortable enough to confidently dial-in optimal settings that don't need this 'scattergun' approach.
in reply to Greg

Hey, that's pretty cool! It looks like my camera does support bracketing, so I'll check that out.
in reply to Neil E. Hodges

That is a very well-regarded camera, Neil. Hope my approach leads to you enjoying your time with it, more. As a further refinement, use it in program (P) mode so you only need to dial an exposure setting (which will then shift the whole 'bracket' lighter or darker). The less 'futzing' time, the more 'capture' time etc. There is a UK guy on Flickr called Neil Howard who shoots with the same camera if you want to see what it can do.