How To Photograph Harsh Midday Light Part 2
A little while ago I published a blog where I shared some tips on shooting in harsh light. That blog was very popular and in hindsight I realised I left a few suggestions out. If you haven’t read that blog I have linked it below so read it first then come back here.
How To Photograph Hard Midday Light Part 1
Finally before we get going a quick word on why you would even shoot in harsh light when everyone else won’t shut up about golden hour. The answer is simple… life. Most people are not full time photographers with zero responsibilities. Most people have jobs, families and other life things. When you’re travelling, you might only have the midday available. Lastly you can be like me and detest waking up early. Shooting during these harsh hours is the only option for many. Plus let’s face it, you don’t want to be 100% reliant on specific light.
Brightness
I don’t know where this came from but I remember always being told to underexpose your photos. For some weird reason there is this weird obsession with under exposing by 1 or more stops. However if you look at these images shot at midday with 0 exposure compensation, they appear rather dim and underexposed. So the first tip is to increase exposure however not in camera but in editing. If you do it in camera you are risking having some blown out areas. Leave the camera between 0 or maybe drop slightly to -0.3 if the light is really harsh. Then when you’re in the edit, increase the exposure or brightness. As you can see the end result looks much better than what has come straight out of camera.
Go Abstract
If you’re in a particularly high contrast environment, just expose for the highlights and make it into more of an abstract or fine art style photo. As we discussed in the previous video, don’t fight the contrast. Instead work with it. So go and find those tiny pockets of light especially in a city and see what you can come up with.
White Balance
In 99% of cases auto white balance does a great job and one would argue that the photo you see now is correctly white balanced. However I found that slightly warming up the image always leads to a more pleasant look compared to the correct white balance. In some cases also adding a touch of green can help. However be careful with the green as it is easy to overkill and make your image look all muddy. Do this adjustment in editing and not in camera.
Clarity & Sharpening
Harsh light can make everything appear, well, harsh. If your image has a lot of fine detail, then this will be even more obvious. So rather than sharpening the shit out of your photos for reasons no one will ever know, I suggest actually reducing your clarity and removing any sharpening. By softening the edge details and edge contrast, you will have an overall softer appearance thus removing some of that harshness that comes with midday light.
Shooting Wide Open
If you own an f1.2 lens and only shoot at f1.2 then this tip might make you wet your pants. If the scene is very harsh, then perhaps try to open up the lens and have the background or foreground slightly out of focus. This will smooth things out and in many cases help. Now don’t go crazy and shoot everything wide open, do it tastefully. The issue you will run into is brightness as you are shooting in midday after all. You have two options, an ND filter or electronic shutter. I personally use an ND filter as I switch between photo and video so it works, but for you electronic shutter might also do the trick.
