In today’s tip we will learn a very nifty technique that you can apply in any situation no matter what equipment you’ll have “at hand”. Photographer David Bergman and AdoramaTV share a quick way to test your camera’s parameters before the shoot.
Mr. Bergman shares: “There are a lot of settings on our cameras these days so many settings things like flash settings, auto focus, exposure compensation, etc. I change those constantly depending on what I’m shooting. Sometimes I might pick up my camera for the next shoot and not realize I had changed something, and everything’s gonna be all wrong. For example, let’s take flash exposure compensation. There are times when I want to under or over expose my subject. I’m gonna change that on the flash.”
“Then at the next shoot I want to go back to normal and I forget that I’ve changed it, and everything comes out underexposed! So what do I do to make sure that doesn’t happen? I take a picture of my hand at the beginning of every single shoot!”
“Why would I use my hand? First of all, it’s always attached to my body. I don’t have to hunt around in my bag for a grey card or a color chart – it doesn’t matter, my hand is always attached to my body.”
“Another reason to use my hand is that I can see what my exposure looks like on skin. Of course I have to mentally compensate for other skin tones but it’ll give me a really good starting point. Taking a picture of my hand lets me know that everything is working. I can see that my exposure is correct and no compensation is being applied. if I’m using continuous autofocus, I can move the focus point on or off my hand and make sure that’s working properly. if I’m using a flash with ambient light I can make sure the ratio of foreground and background is exactly how I want it. And of course I’ll immediately know if my flash batteries are dead and it’s not firing at all. So get in the habit of taking a picture of your hand before every shoot and you’ll have peace of mind and know that everything’s working!”
*For more information visit AdoramaTV YT page, and of course you can keep up with David on Instagram and Twitter @DavidBergman. LATEST UPDATE: David opened up new IGTV episodes where you can ask him questions live! find out more at http://www.AskDavidBergman.com
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Watch the full episode with David Bergman and Adorama TV: