Taking pictures of bright places- the beach, a sunny sky, or during this time of year, in snow, often results in images that look too dark. Why would a bright scene make a dark image?
Your camera's light sensor assumes that a scene is reflecting about 18% of the light hitting it- this magic number of 18% is derived from the approximate reflectance of Caucasian skin.
When photographing a subject that reflects much more light than that- a bright sky or white snow- the meter is estimating a lower level of reflectance, thus the camera stops down the aperture (or increases the shutter speed, or both) to reduce the amount of light being captured. The result is an underexposed image.
Find out what's happening in Danversfor free with the latest updates from Patch.
The opposite occurs as well. When a dark scene is captured, the camera is expecting 18% reflectance when, in fact, the reflectance is much lower. This fools the camera into letting too much light onto the sensor, artificially brightening the image and minimizing contrast.
The fix, in both cases, is a bit counter-intuitive: In bright scenes, manually adjust the camera to allow more light in. In dark scenes, adjust the camera to let less light in. Try half-stops worth of variation first and adjust as needed.
