Why do bright red flowers lose detail in outdoor photos, and how can I avoid it in-camera?
Asked 4/9/2011
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When I photograph flowers with a Nikon D5000 outdoors in sunlight, bright red flowers often turn into a flat, detail-less area. Violet and blue flowers usually keep their detail, and indoor flower shots look fine. Sometimes bright yellow flowers do this too.
This is with unprocessed JPEGs straight from the camera. Is this a camera defect, or is the red channel getting overexposed? What camera settings or shooting approach can help preserve detail in bright red petals without relying on Photoshop?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
15y ago
2 Answers
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When shooting red flowers I usually have to tell the camera to underexpose from what it thinks is the correct exposure. I don't know if the D5000 has separate histograms for red, green, and blue. If it does then you can use the red histogram to make sure you're not blowing out the red highlights. Otherwise you'll have to check the picture and on the camera and see if you can see detail in the flower - if you can't tell the camera to underexpose a bit more and try again.
I believe it's because most camera's metering is biased towards green, but I don't have any sources to back that up apart from my own memory. Your red flower will have very little green in it and so the camera will overexpose it, losing the detail.
Originally by user3521. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user3521
15y ago
0
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This is usually not a camera defect. The most likely cause is that the red channel is clipping in strong sunlight, so fine tonal differences in the petals are lost and the flower becomes a flat red area.
What to do in-camera:
- Reduce exposure a little. Try negative exposure compensation and review the result.
- If your camera offers RGB histograms or highlight warnings, check whether the red channel is blown.
- Review the image on the LCD and keep backing off exposure until petal detail returns.
- If you use Nikon Picture Control, avoid highly saturated settings like Vivid for red flowers; Standard or Neutral can help keep reds from being pushed too far in JPEGs.
Also, red subjects naturally show fewer visible tonal differences than blue or green ones, so some loss of apparent texture compared with blue flowers is normal. But if the whole flower turns into a single uniform patch, that points to overexposure of the red channel.
So: slightly underexpose, watch the red channel/highlights, and use a less aggressive JPEG color profile.
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