TECHNIQUE ASSESSMENT

Was Enid ready to take the plunge?

Enid loves experimenting with her settings, but a more methodical approach will pay dividends…

Manual labour

Nigel says… Enid tends to start out with her camera in full auto mode, and only ventures into other shooting modes to experiment, without necessarily understanding how these work. With waterfalls, I almost always shoot in manual mode, as it gives me full control over both the aperture and shutter speed, and enables me to set my exposure and then forget about it (see below).

Spot the difference

Nigel says… Enid doesn’t really think about metering, but as waterfalls contain both bright highlights and deep shadows, it pays to be precise. I try to spot-meter from a midtone, as my camera will then suggest settings that will render this area as an average midtone, and so expose the highlights and shadows correctly.

RAW ingredients

Nigel says… Enid never shoots RAW, but because of the wide range of tones in a waterfall shot it’s vital to capture as much tonal information as possible. At the very least she should shoot RAW + JPEG, so that she can revisit the RAW files when she learns how to process them (see Nikopedia 1 on page 76 for more).