FunkyL Loc: MD

At night, or in very dim light, the human eye loses the ability to see color, while allowing perception of detail in black and white if there is some ambient light. The camera still records the colors. It seems to me that this sometimes results in photos which include colors which the photographer or bystander would not have been able to perceive at the time. Sometimes these really work, other times they appear garish and weird to me. Is there a way to get closer to what my eye sees in shots with a combination of brightly colored lights and low ambient light?

For example, if I look at my Christmas tree with the room lights off, I see intense colors close to the lights, fading fairly quickly to shadowy greys and faint hints of color in the rest of the room, but I can still see considerable detail in the room. If I take a photo, it shows walls as bright as a Hawaiian shirt, with all the colors of the tree lights clearly visible. If I reduce the exposure, the shadows get dark, but remain colored, and much of the detail is lost. If I reduce saturation or vibrance in post, ( I use PSE 2019 )the entire photo is washed out... The example below is the "Hawaiian shirt" version. A shorter exposure darkens the left side of the wall to a muddy greenish brown. My eye saw the colored shadows only where the branches were very close to the wall, the rest to the wall fading quickly to a mix of grey shadows and pale hints of color.

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Don’t fight it. Cameras are your eyes when you’re using cameras.

What you believe you see by eye is not any reliable baseline, it’s mostly memory and imagination. Cameras have no visual memory and no imagination. Go with the phlow ... or take up drawing and painting.

If you wanna learn something about all this, don’t bother overly much about learning camera lore. Learn about human vision and perception. Then you’ll be freed from trying to record something that isn’t really there in the first place (except in your head).

Quixdraw Loc: x

A good news / bad news situation. The technology is amazing. When you get more than anticipated it can result in a very good image. When you are attempting to capture what you are actually seeing, it can be a challenge.

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Problem is that “what you are actually seeing” is a fictional construct, a mental projection. The camera doesn’t impose mental impressions on reality. It just operates as it’s designed to operate. It doesn’t care what you think you see.

Quixdraw Loc: x

Thing is, given the skill, film Nikons would capture the picture one saw, and do it consistently. I guess the film cared enough.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Your optical sensors work differently that the camera's sensor.

Drbobcameraguy Loc: Eaton Ohio

Your exposure is still much to high to duplicate what your eye sees. Keep dropping exposure until it almost matches what you see. I found that out trying to photograph my wife's Christmas houses. I was underexposed several stops before the pic looked right.

wdross Loc: Castle Rock, Colorado

For the situation, the camera did well although it did the "18% gray". A little bit less exposure would be more to my liking. Yes, the eyes change with darkness and older eyes even more so. Let the camera take the shot and then change the shot as you want the shot to be. I think just a little less exposure, not enough to "muddy" the wall, will bring out the shot you were hoping to see - depending on what you preconceived. Also, choose a slightly greater different angle between the wall and the camera. A lot of the reflected light at that angle will be the same level of light from the tree.

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But the real difference isnt your sensors, it’s your algorithms ;-)

Wallen Loc: Middle Earth

To capture what is there - Camera
To capture what you see - Editing/Post

Humans do not see everything, see things that is not there and can easily be confused
Just like what Neil deGrasse Tyson said, "Eye witness account is the worst kind of proof".
& "Optical illusions are really visual failure".

If you want to record what you see directly, the most similar would be to shoot a video and screen capture.

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Amen on all of that.
Great summation.

Quixdraw Loc: x

So now, I need to process what I could / can reliably get with film cameras. Dam' ain't technology great!

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Somebody had to process your film. The immediate capture looked nothing similar to the world, since it was invisible. I can process several digital images in the time it took for an instant film image to come up. Ain’t technology great ! Clearly, you have great fun despising it. Good on yuh.

Jimmy T Loc: Virginia

Pure Wisdom that makes me . . .
Smile,
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