Photographing snow & minus EV
Some photographers recommend using a positive Exposure Value when photographing snow under clear and cloudy skies (+1.5 to +2 EV under clear skies and +.5 to +1 for cloudy skies).
When asked about the recommendation in his article for using minus EV, Bernard Dery replies:
"I know this is an subject open to debate. You have to decide if you want your snow to be perfectly white before post-processing (editing) or if you want to preserve some texture to it."
By increasing the EV value, snow remains pure white but it will likely be blown (washed out looking). If you lower the EV value, your snow might look a bit gray but will still have texture. You can then fine-tune the actual whiteness when post processing.
Bernard also makes the following points:
- if a scene has a few things that are not snow (a tree, for instance) then overexposing is likely to blow it completely. Depending on the metering, it's quite probable that darker objects are almost over-exposed as it is, so it might be safer to underexpose to preserve their detail too.
- if the scene has many objects, not primarily snow, then the camera should meter properly in most cases.
- the biggest danger when photographing snow is not exposure, it's white balance if you're not careful. Exposure comes just after, but it's better to get a slightly gray snow patch than a blue snow patch.
He says:
"There is never one single 'right' way to take pictures, the article is simply my take on the matter. I use minus Exposure Compensation and it has served me well so far.
"For those with a histogram, a good way to work would be to expose to the right (without clipping).
"For those with exposure bracketing, take multpile shots and see what works for you."
