ETTR - the "Experts" have spoken...

[John King]

Interesting. However that post is back to 2011, very old in the digital age. And as said in some previous posts, with today modern sensors and better dynamic range, it is probably best to expose to the right and not over expose, at least not always.... Different scenes might provide different results....

@andreuscia Welcome to this forum, Andrea.

 

[andreuscia]

It was an interesting and in some cases a challenging discussion, thank you to all...

It's amazing to think, optimizing exposure is so basic, interesting, and significant in terms of improving IQ. This basic know-how can help photographers improve image quality.

To summarize:

1. Exposure:
- Shutter Speed and Aperture determines how much light reach the sensor
- One can optimize the external environment with a flash or reflector plus plus
- Image sensors perform optimally when it receives the right amount of exposure
- The more accurate one expose the sensor, the better it performs - this is key
- Most of the time Olympus cameras will select safe & conservative exposures
- ETTR is a simple technique to help photographers find the "best" exposure
- Call it ETTR or "best" exposure @ any ISO, sensors are better at "best" exposure

2. The ISO setting
- The ISO setting adjusts image brightness (it's not important how it's done)
- The ISO does not change the amount of light reaching the sensor
- In most cases, image noise increase as the ISO increase
- A basic method to keep noise to a minimum is to select the exposure accurately,
and to keep the ISO as low as possible (IBIS is a great help to lower ISO)

One can spend hours talking more about the relevant inputs by Swifty and Exacta and yes it is very interesting, especially for the technical minded.

In most cases, I rely on my camera metering, in challenging conditions I prefer to apply these simple techniques to get higher-quality results...

To optimize your camera exposure, apply this simple method:-

1. Fix the ISO to the value you require (Go to the SCP and select an ISO)
2. By selecting an ISO you ensuring its fixed, the next steps only adjust exposure
3. Set your aperture or shutter speed (A or S mode) and press the shutter halfway
4. Check the histogram (the exposure meter should read 0EV)
5. The camera "auto" mode will generally select a lower or conservative exposure
6. If there is free space on the right of the histogram, increase the exposure
7. Follow the histogram as it moves to the right. (Do not move it too far right)
8. The exposure meter will show you overexposing by a 1/3, 2/3 or 1 stop
9. When you are satisfied with the histogram, your exposure is optimized...
10. You can now safely take the image

Your image will be a little overexposed. This is easy to correct in the camera with curves or in Photoshop Raw. The image will now have less noise and more image data to work with in post-processing.

Siegfrid, your great summary is indeed perfect overall speaking. It makes a perfect sense and very balanced solution and approch to ETTR. Thank you!

 

[BushmanOrig]

Siegfrid, your great summary is indeed perfect overall speaking. It makes a perfect sense and very balanced solution and approch to ETTR. Thank you!

Thank you Andreuscia, I appreciate your kind feedback.