D2H Settings

[JamesJWeg]

Why do all my shots seem dull with the D2H, did I miss something in the settings? I am having to do color correction on my pics from it to make them look right.

Original
http://jamesjweg.smugmug.com/photos/17750684-M.jpg

Auto color correction in smugmug, this is more like it really looked.
http://jamesjweg.smugmug.com/photos/17745637-M-1.jpg

James.

[JohnR]

Did you upgrade the firmware?

What settings did you have it on?

Are you shooting in jpeg or NEF?

[JamesJWeg]

I have not played with too much in way of settings. No, have not upgraded, I did not see where that cover anything like this. Shooting JPEG Large Fine.

James.

[JohnR]

I mean, what did you have the camera set to? What was your shutter speed and all?

I upgraded mine. I heard it did some good changes and was worth upgrading.

[JamesJWeg]

I mean, what did you have the camera set to? What was your shutter speed and all?

I upgraded mine. I heard it did some good changes and was worth upgrading.
Date Taken:2005-03-18 21:14:43
Date Digitized:2005-03-18 21:14:43
Date Modified:2005-03-18 21:14:43
Make:NIKON CORPORATION
Model: NIKON D2H
Size: 2464x1632
Bytes: 1690470
Aperture: f/8.5
ISO: 200
Focal Length: 120mm (180mm 35mm)
Exposure Time: 0.0031s (10/3200)
JPEG Quality:fine
Exposure Program:Normal program
Exposure Bias:0
DigitalZoomRatio:1/1
SensingMethod:One-chip color sensor
ColorSpace:sRGB


James.

[JamesJWeg]

I mean, what did you have the camera set to? What was your shutter speed and all?

I upgraded mine. I heard it did some good changes and was worth upgrading.
I read the info and it didn't sound related to exposure, just operational items.

James.

[bfjr]

I could be dead wrong here :scratch, but looking at the two images it's looks like you metered a bright area (white on truck or building) and the camera turned it all to 18 % gray.

Again could be way off, don't even own that camera, but I've seen the same in my photos when I've metered only the bright (spot) and not adjusted, or allowed the camera to make an overall decision.

Hope that helps, if not you can ignore me :D

[JamesJWeg]

I could be dead wrong here :scratch, but looking at the two images it's looks like you metered a bright area (white on truck or building) and the camera turned it all to 18 % gray.

Again could be way off, don't even own that camera, but I've seen the same in my photos when I've metered only the bright (spot) and not adjusted, or allowed the camera to make an overall decision.

Hope that helps, if not you can ignore me :DI think you may not be that far off, except that I had it on the color matrix setting, I though that would adjust better than this, maybe I need to meter elsewhere.

James.

[JamesJWeg]

I did not reframe after metering. I was working on the assumption that it could handle the large white areas when on color matrix. Is that anm incorrect assumption?

James.

[david_h]

James, I think your problem is that your image is under exposed. Look at this screenshot and see how far your histogram is shifted to the left.

http://djh.smugmug.com/photos/17753095-L.jpg

Do you have any negative exposure compensation set? If not, you might want to add a positive exposure compensation.
I'd play around with the exposure compensation setting until you like what you see.
When you do the auto colour correction, it is looking for the lightest point and calling it white (or close to). This has the effect of stretching the histogram to the right to fill the range, giving the impression of a better exposed image.

Here's the same screenshot, but with your "corrected" image. See how much nicer the histogram looks. You need to aim to see this straight from the camera. There's a histogram display for the review on the camera LCD so you can see how you're doing as you shoot.
http://djh.smugmug.com/photos/17753706-L.jpg

[JamesJWeg]

Thanks david, I may try that, I was on 0.

James.

[david_h]

Thanks david, I may try that, I was on 0.

James. Also, I don't know what metering mode you are using, but I get best results with the matrix metering. You might know all about this already, but if not it's explained on page 84 (or 85?) in the manual. I use this in apature prority mode and usually get pretty good images straight from my camera - they just need a little fine tuning and I'm happy with them.

Edit: Duh - I just read your post where you already said you were using matrix metering.