This has been a real cold and snowy winter here in northeast Ohio. If you’re like me, you see a lot of people post pictures of snow scenes on social media. One problem I see consistently with these photos is they are “under exposed”. That means they are too dark. I have to admit my cell phone produces the same results.
I finally said, enough is enough. I started to scroll through the camera settings on my cell phone and found what may be referred to as “exposure” or “brightness” control. I pointed my cell phone out the patio door and took two pictures of a snow scene in my back yard. The first was shot at the normal exposure. The second photo I increased the exposure by +2. You’ll notice the show is much whiter. Actually the +2 setting is a bit too much of an increase. A setting of +1 or +1.5 might have been enough.
Anyway, try this with your cell phone. Scroll through the settings menu looking for your phone’s exposure compensation control. See how much difference it makes. Then tell me what you think.
Snow scene photographed with exposure adjustment set to normal.
The 2nd. image was captured with the exposure set at +2.
