[Critiquing Skills and Issues] When detail in a shot is bleached or "blown away" is it really overexposed?

[[Geoff Slocock]]

This is a reposting which I think will be useful to quote in some responses I make in future to requests for opinions on shots. Many times there are cogent arguments for saying that a shot is overexposed. But caution is always necessary. Firstly there are fine art examples of shots that could be said to be "overexposed". Secondly camera users may be so used to seeing bleached out shots that they might not realise that better results can really be aimed for. Lack of dynamic range in the camera sensor will often mean that tone mapping treatment is advisable, too.

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I've been looking around for images on the web where overexposure is felt to be justified.

http://flickr.com/photos/10211031@N03/1485196657/

http://digital-photography-school.com/wp...ea-o-3.jpg

http://flickr.com/photos/johnworthington/2625742173/

I guess the main way one can justify if is your main subject is clearly exposed and the other detail actually benefits form being made less clear.

In this case it is used however to produce an almost abstract effect.

http://flickr.com/photos/melodygates/1431494468/

I was almost caught on the hop in the earlier discussion. I did say there are no hard and fast rules... and there aren't. This can disconcerting I know, because having hard and fast rules can make life simpler.

Another example where over exposure seems to work in my opinion is in LeeBone's comp entry. Here a lot of the plumage detail has been lost but this is an impressionistic work, and is not real life.



Providing critical comment can be hard because one is always at risk of making matters more complicated than needs be. And indeed I used to argue with some of the critiques of the shots that I made, saying that blown away detail didn't matter.

But none of this a science, and is an art; and the debate has to be weighed a bit carefully.

What I will think about doing now is writing this post up for putting into another part of the forum. I kind of think it might have been better not to go into this depth for answering this query. But I can be better prepared for the next time.

Going back to your water feature shots, it can also be said, Martin, that is best to include significant dark areas in a shot. You see the flowing water is just not going to have any texture to it, so it rather needs to be set off by dark areas of some some sort.

Now as I say this, I have my doubts, because there are always exceptions to such a generality. And I am not that widely experienced that I can be sure, either.