geomirmurr1963

Our annual family reunion are held in a picnic pavilion covered by a roof and open on 3 sides (the only side with a wall is the kitchen where food may be kept warm). Taking photos of relatives where the camera is pointed out toward the lighted sides is challenging because the automatic feature of the camera causes the people to be darkened. And when I take a photo pointing toward the kitchen, there's a lot of clutter in the background. Is the only solution involve hanging a curtain? Taking the groups outside the pavilion is not really a viable option because the sun is always really bright.

mdorn Loc: Portland, OR

The sun can't "always" be bright where you live, can it? :-) I wouldn't know because I live in Portland. ha ha...Take your shot with the light behind your subjects, but make sure you use some fill flash.

Db7423 Loc: Pittsburgh, PA

Another solution is to meter on your subjects. What camera were you using? ;)

SharpShooter Loc: NorCal

Yes, either use flash or spot meter the person. With spot meter, the background will be blown out, but it's probably not important to you. You can do the same on manual also.
Good luck. SS

geomirmurr1963

Many thanks for your responses. Using Panasonic DMC-ZS5 and Nikon Coolpix.

Db7423 Loc: Pittsburgh, PA

I am not familiar with either camera. If either allows you to change metering modes change it to spot metering and meter on your subject. As SS said the background will be light but that is much better than your subjects being dark. ;)

Armadillo Loc: Ventura, CA

One option is to pop-up the on board flash, set the camera mode to "P" (Program), meter the window for exposure by pressing the shutter 1/2 way down, recompose for the subjects, and complete the capture by pushing the shutter all the way down. The Flash will fill in the darker subjects back-lit by the window.

BHC Loc: Strawberry Valley, JF, USA

Consider +2 compensation.

rpavich Loc: West Virginia

True,
Either crank the exposure compensation up 2 or 3 stops to fool the camera

OR

Just meter on your hand in the shade of the pavillion and set the camera to manual mode using the settings that the camera chose and fire away knowing that everything will be exposed perfectly.

Patw28 Loc: PORT JERVIS, NY

This is really a case for going full manual. No, stop! It's really easy!
The idea is to take a flash photo of the subjects while starving the background of light.

Complicated? No. You only have to set the f-stop to a high number and the shutter speed to 1/200. Nothing mysterious going on. "Nothing to see here. Move along!" :-)

Why so simple?

Your built in flash in its auto mode(TTL) is going to properly expose any subject within its range, regardless of the f-stop you set. It's flash only lasts some 1/2000 or 1/20,000, depending on the model. It's always the same speed. It gets the proper exposure of the subject by varying its power output during that time. And it does so depending only in the f-stop that you set. So set the f-stop for a tiny opening. It doesn't care a bit how long you're going to leave the shutter open. It's all done with its job of exposing the foreground subject in that 1/2000 of a second.

But the camera does care. With the flash all done with its work, the rest of the time that the shutter is open is devoted entirely to rushing the background light in through that tiny f-stop. So set that shutter speed to as fast as you can to cut down how much time it has to do that.

Unfortunately, the fastest you can coordinate the speed of the two curtains that shoot across the lens opening with the flash firing is 1/200 on most cameras, 1/250 on some. So set the shutter speed at that fastest 'sync' speed.
That's as much as you can reduce the background exposure without some trickery.

Now the subject will be exposed properly by the flash while the camera continues to gather in more background light only through that tiny f-stop for the shortest time that you can control and still keeping the shutter and flash synchronized.

You've exposed the close-up subject with the flash while starving the background of light with the shutter speed.

NO! It is not complicated. "Digital film doesn't cost a thing." Take two minutes to go outside and try it.

Camera mode: manual.
F-stop small.
Shutter speed 1/200.
Point and shoot.

Wahawk Loc: NE IA

With those options, set you flash to ALWAYS instead of Auto. This will force the flash to go off and properly expose the subject, leaving the background over-exposed but probably not enough to affect the groups or individuals.

So amazing at how many answers this has gotten that pertain to cameras with full manual control instead of P&S style camera that you have. :lol: :lol:

GoofyNewfie Loc: Kansas City

Some people just don't read all the posts.
(I'm guilty of that myself sometimes)

Harvey Loc: Pioneer, CA

What PP program are you using? CS4 and up has a "Shadow/Highlight" feature that does wonders with this type of image.

bunuweld Loc: Arizona

Point your camera towards the kitchen and press the shutter halfway. With the button still halfway pressed, turn to your guests and complete the shot. You can run a trial run with your own household members to see whether this works. It ouhgt to work if the kitchen receives the same amount of light as what the group would receive and the respective distances from the camera are not very different.

Kingmapix Loc: Mesa, Arizona

Try some HDR shots.