Adjusting the Size, Quality Level, Brightness, and Color Tone

3

Pictures Taking

Using the Histogram

This camera has a function for displaying a graph (histogram) that shows the tonal range of your scene with the darkest areas on the left and the brightest ones to the right. The height of the points along the graph show the number of pixels at each brightness value.

The shape of the histogram, which can be viewed before and after shooting, shows the brightness and contrast of the picture so you can decide if you want to use EV compensation to improve it.

1 “Displaying Shooting Information in Capture Mode” (p.41), “Displaying Shooting Information” (p.88)

Understanding Brightness

Usually, if the exposure is correct, the graph peaks in the middle. If the image is too dark, the peak is on the left side, and if it is too bright, the peak is on the right side.

Dark image

 

Correct image

 

Bright image

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When the image is too dark, the part to the left is cut off (dark portions) and when the image is too bright, the part to the right is cut off (bright portions).

With EV compensation, you can adjust the exposure so that the distribution is contained within the graph without the graph peaking on the left or right side, thereby preventing pictures that are too dark or too light.

Understanding Contrast

The graph peaks gradually for images in which contrast is balanced. The graph peaks on both sides but sinks in the middle for images with a large difference in contrast and low amounts of

60mid-level brightness.