We talked about accurately metering to make sure that the white buildings came out very bright and white. Our technique was to get close to and zoom in on a white column to fill the frame.
We then experimented with exposure. Most of us found that OVEREXPOSING this area by about one and a half stops made the white columns look really white without losing detail. SO we set our exposure, zoomed out, and took pictures of the architecture.
Notice that the white columns are a brilliant white.
Normally our meters would be trying to expose for the sky, the dark windows, and the shadows in the archways. We were only concerned with the white columns, though, and we got a nice result.
Next we talked about moving our subject out of the harsh/direct sunlight and adding some soft/reflected light to make them pop out from the background.
So we put Mary in some shade, and shot her against an equally shady background. Then Jill reflected some sunlight on her to make her stand out.We'll need to check out Nancy's photo to see the result. (can you send me a copy please?)
We also went to the shady side of the building and took a couple of frames of Jill with the sun at her back (so we were also shooting the shady side of Jill). We exposed for our background to get a neutral-gray building with a blue sky. (We could also have OVEREXPOSED the building like we did before to get bright white, but we would probably have lost the blue sky). THEN we added some light from a reflector.
Those were the basics of the class. Please feel free to post any questions or comments below in the comments section so that everyone can take part.
We do not meet Sunday July 6th. We'll be getting together at South Street Seaport on Sunday July 13th.
-jeremy-
