Reducing glare from lights at night

[E65Ross]

As per my other thread some of you will know I've just purchased a Sony DSC-RX100 camera which I must say I'm very impressed with so far.

As sad as it is I was having a play around with it last night and just wanted to see if I could get a good image of the angel eyes of my car, but from a distance they came out with too much glare like this (I've shrunk the image to mean I can upload it at under 2MB).....



Yet up close it wasn't too bad



I was quite pleased with this interior one though....just a bit of reflection from the steering wheel though



Many thanks in advance

[Simpo Two]

I think it's not so much glare as just 'very bright compared to the rest of the image'.

In the close-up I suspect your camera has stopped down to compensate for the bright light (as it's now occupying a much larger area of the screen) hence it's less bright.

In short your headlights are a gazillion times brighter than the rest of the image - no camera can expose for both at once.

[Janesy B]

The up close one wasn't so bad because the camera metered for the lights and the area around it is completely dark!

[mojitomax]

What are angel eyes?

[ExPat2B]

To get the camera to meter for the light take a bit of jiggering on the RX100.

Change meter mode to spot. The "spo't" cant be moved and it is the centre of the screen.

Point the spot at the headlight, then press AE Lock.

Then recompose to the original composition by physically panning the camera back so the spot is in the centre of the bonnet.

Then take the photo.

Voila, one photo with the lights properly exposed.

Of course, the rest of the image will be too dark, so shoot in RAW and bring the image into lightroom and pull the shadows up to compensate, then noise reduce them.

[E65Ross]

ExPat2B said:

To get the camera to meter for the light take a bit of jiggering on the RX100.

Change meter mode to spot. The "spo't" cant be moved and it is the centre of the screen.

Point the spot at the headlight, then press AE Lock.

Then recompose to the original composition by physically panning the camera back so the spot is in the centre of the bonnet.

Then take the photo.

Voila, one photo with the lights properly exposed.

Of course, the rest of the image will be too dark, so shoot in RAW and bring the image into lightroom and pull the shadows up to compensate, then noise reduce them.

That sounds complex (to me) but I'll give it a go!

2 questions....how do you change meter mode to spot, and what do you mean by the AE lock?

As you can guess, I'm a complete amateur but I'm keen to learn!!

[Janesy B]

E65Ross said:

That sounds complex (to me) but I'll give it a go!

2 questions....how do you change meter mode to spot, and what do you mean by the AE lock?

As you can guess, I'm a complete amateur but I'm keen to learn!!

If you're keen to learn, RTFM

http://docs.esupport.sony.com/dvimag/DSCRX100_guid...

http://docs.esupport.sony.com/dvimag/DSCRX100_guid...

Just set the centre button for AEL. Auto Exposure Lock.

[E65Ross]

Janesy B said:

If you're keen to learn, RTFM

http://docs.esupport.sony.com/dvimag/DSCRX100_guid...

http://docs.esupport.sony.com/dvimag/DSCRX100_guid...

Just set the centre button for AEL. Auto Exposure Lock.

That's superb, thanks

Will have a sift through more of that stuff when I get the chance.

[E65Ross]

That was easy enough, just need to edit it so the rest of the image is black, and doesn't have the street lights in it! Just did it as a quick trial more than anything else, I would get closer etc to get a decent image but wanted to see if that exposure control worked, which it did