How to Improve Dynamic Range

Shoot in RAW

One of the best ways to improve dynamic range in your photography is to shoot in RAW format. RAW files contain more information than JPEG files, allowing you to recover more detail in both the highlights and shadows during post-processing. Shooting in RAW also gives you greater flexibility when it comes to adjusting exposure, contrast, and other parameters.

Consider Exposure Bracketing as Needed

Exposure bracketing is a technique that involves taking multiple shots of the same scene at different exposures. This is useful in high-contrast scenes where it may be challenging to capture all the detail in a single shot. By combining the shots in post-processing, you can create a final image with a wider dynamic range.

The highlight alert is an important that should be used in conjunction with the histogram. If any highlights are blown out, an enabled highlight alert will blink over the affected area (see the image below).

Pro Tip: Add the Highlight Alert as one of the items in your quick menu (if you have that option – be sure to check your camera manual if necessary) so that you can turn it on and off quickly as needed. Although you’ll want to enable the highlight alert while shooting, you may want to show your clients the images on the back of the camera at some point, and you don’t want to distract them with the blinking highlight alert.

Adjust Picture Style to Flat Profile

Locate your Picture Style settings in your camera’s menu system. Your camera will likely default to the ‘Auto’ option and we don’t want that, in fact, none of these picture styles are ideal so we are going to make our own User Setting.

You want to make this custom picture style as flat and neutral as possible. I’ve turned the Contrast, Sharpness and  Saturation all the way down to keep the image looking as flat as possible to retain all the information in your image. Your images will look a bit more flat and less contrasted in-camera but at the end of the day, you’ll get better information when you’re exposing.

Shoot at the Optimal Time of Day

The time of day can have a significant impact on the dynamic range of a scene. Shooting during the golden hour, which is the hour after sunrise or before sunset, can result in a wider dynamic range due to the softer and warmer light. Additionally, shooting in overcast or cloudy weather can also help to reduce the contrast in a scene, resulting in a wider dynamic range.

Use Graduated Neutral Density Filters

Graduated neutral density filters are used to reduce the amount of light entering the lens in specific areas of the image. These filters are particularly useful in landscape photography when the sky is much brighter than the foreground. By using a graduated neutral density filter, you can balance the exposure between the sky and the foreground, resulting in a more evenly exposed image.

Manually Select LCD Brightness Setting

Locate your Camera LCD Brightness setting in your menu. Most cameras are set to ‘Auto’ LCD brightness to adapt to the ambient light around you. What ends up happening is that as we go from indoor to outdoor scenes we rely more on how the image looks on the LCD screen as a depiction of our camera exposure which in turn can make you over or underexpose your photo. Setting the brightness manually gives you a more reliable way to judge what you see. If you 100% trust yourself to remember to change it between different shooting scenarios, you can manually adjust it so that you know exactly how your image is meant to look and the LCD is optimized for different ambient light levels, but for most of us, selecting a brighter setting and sticking with that throughout your shoot.

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