Exercise 28 - Measuring Exposure Part 2

The second part of this involved making a range of exposures from the same scene.
I decided to do this exercise whilst working late and as such kept my camera on its widest aperture which is F2.
As I was using my compact camera it seemed wise to vary the shutter speed to affect the exposure rather than the aperture as the narrowest aperture is F8 and this may have limited the exercise's success.

The first range of images is a still life showing my keys, a radio and a few other bits. I composed this to see the difference in colour and also the computer screen.

The average exposure is as it should be, there is a balance and the grey desk in the foreground is the correct saturation.

I personally prefer the shot that is half a stop brighter in this series as the desk becomes more high key and the keys seem brighter and more interesting to the eye.

The second range of photos was a birds eye view of the reception taken from the top floor. I wanted to see the differences in the dappled light and shadow that the range of exposures would have.


The average exposure is well lit and the green of the plants can be seen more clearly.


I quite like the image that is half a stop brighter as the curved wall becomes more of a feature, but again the photo that is half a stop darker is more atmospheric and the depth of the image is increased.

Next I took a range of photos which I will call "The Shelf Above The Kettle".
A odd choice, but I aimed a desk light at the scene and tried to create some shadow effects.

The average exposure brings out the colours and the shadows quite nicely but there is burnt highlights on the sugar cubes in the bottom right. The brighter exposures increase this problem but if the focal point of the image needed to be the milk, then this would have been a good result, as the highlights burn out detail, the red text of the milk is still prominent.

The next range was of a small stone head on a window ledge. I chose this to see the effects of the eye colour. The darkest image features very prominent eyes and interesting shadow formations. The brightest image has suffered from camera shake due to a 1 second exposure. The average image works best I think.

Best mention first that these are in the wrong order and the last two on the right should be swapped round.

This is my favourite of all of the images and is a subject I might return to. This is reminiscent of a scene from One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest amd the different exposures change the focus completely. The brightest image has blown out the lights so that the end of the corridor looks quite near. The focus is on the cleaning sign. The darkest exposure, which is my favourite, makes the image seem much longer as the light is dimmer having had less time to travel to the sensor. the cleaning sign is barely visible and the atmosphere is heightened.