E-PM2: Need help on shadow and dark subjects

[sin77]

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I am wondering if your Olympus camera has the same problem when you shoot black objects in low light or indoor?
Notice that the black is no long black but towards blue/grey.
My Panasonic G3 (in the past) and Nikon D5100 have not shown such problem.

This happens whenever I shoot in low light, and I assume it has nothing to with my white balance set to auto.
Other settings:
Natural
Graduation auto
A-0
G-0
S-0
C-0
RBG-0

Is there any setting I could adjust to avoid such colours?

I am also not comfortable with the skin tone colour, even though set to Natural and deselected 'keep warm colour'. Skin always look reddish. It is even worse when used with a flash.

 

[aidanw]

If it helps, I'm using a calibrated Dell ultrasharp 27 and can confirm the image above does have a blue tinge to the darker regions.
Note, the *images*, not necessarily the capture. You're using Lightroom in Windows, and there could be anything from an sRGB/AdobeRGB mis-match to incorrect colour profiling going on.

Would be better to see a JPG straight from camera.

 

[Halaking]

Set graduation auto to normal and using AEL might help

 

[MichaelShea]

I would have thought the white balance has got everything to do with it. Auto white balance assumes that the image will average out to grey, which clearly this one didn't. A cheap grey card would have given you a different result completely, as would setting a grey and/or black point later in Photoshop.

 

[sin77]

I tried below settings as well but in vain.

Gradation normal
White balance fluorescent
Contrast +1
Centre weighted metering
-0.7 EV
vivid/i-enhance/neutral.


Doesn't give the result I want. Still a bit grey or blue hue.

Do you all encounter such problem with black subject indoor?

 

[Sootchucker]

If it's supposed to be black, then try about -2/3 to -1 EV compensation. It just looks like the meter on the camera tried to "average" the scene (as most cameras would), and so has "lifted" the blacks to a a dark grey, so the metering just needs a little help.

This should return it to the deep black you want.

 

[sin77]

I think it helps when I switch to keep warm colours setting. Is there anyway to access this option quickly without digging into the menu?

 

[yakky]

Do some reading on how a camera evaluates exposure and you'll figure out why its exposing it as grey. Or get a grey card, use center weighted exposure and expose for the grey card, your black will be black.

 

[Evan614]

I would have thought the white balance has got everything to do with it. Auto white balance assumes that the image will average out to grey, which clearly this one didn't.

White balance function does not assume the image will average out to grey. When doing a white balance.. the camera is just trying to even out the color amounts of red green and blue to create an accurate color. Your auto exposure will average out a white card to grey.
If you truly want to get a 'perfect' image. take a photo at your planned exposure with manually set color balance -- of a calibration card that consists of white & black and even better add a gray gradation card that shows 10-12 steps from white to black. All those will help you set, in ACR, your color balance and your dynamic range.
For color critical work: a color calibration chart will help you with color since all chips are bias in some variation and a color chart will help minimize that bias.
Once you do all your magic in ACR use those settings as a base template to all your actual photos you plan to use.
Please note that color light temperature will change slightly over time when you are outside. clouds and sun levels cause that slight variation. So doing another chart photo at the end of your work or when cloud cover rolls in, will help.

 

[RichardB]

I am wondering if your Olympus camera has the same problem when you shoot black objects in low light or indoor?
Notice that the black is no long black but towards blue/grey.
My Panasonic G3 (in the past) and Nikon D5100 have not shown such problem.

This happens whenever I shoot in low light, and I assume it has nothing to with my white balance set to auto.

Adjust the white balance. It looks like the black controller is on a surface with a warm tint, which is causing the camera to cool the colors. For best control, shoot RAW so you can easily adjust the white balance in post-processing.

I am also not comfortable with the skin tone colour, even though set to Natural and deselected 'keep warm colour'. Skin always look reddish. It is even worse when used with a flash.

Have you tried Portrait mode? You would get a better feel for the effects of different settings if you shot RAW and played with the images in Olympus Viewer 3. When you find the settings you like, you can set the camera to use them so you don't need to post-process.

 

[Pecos]

The BLUEness of the lens cap is a white balance issue. Try changing the white balance setting.
The BRIGHTness of the lens cap is an exposure issue. Close the aperture down, use a faster shutter speed, or reduce ISO to make it darker.