Hi all,

today I was trying my fresh new AX100 at the zoo in Zürich. It was a cloudy day, but I still had some trouble in trying to film a little monkey walking on the top of a tree (approx. distance was 10mt) as I was not able to have the right exposure. I was shooting automatically, and was trying to adjust with a polarizer but the monkey was always too dark (and when I tried to increase the gain the sky literally blew up).

Any advice for similar situation (do not tell me to change position....problem was not the direct sunlight....it was that I was shooting at the sky from the bottom...and I could not simply change position.... :-) )? Should I have used the ND filter? If so, how and why?

You have 4 options that I can think of.............

1) Use a massive video light - although if the subject is in the tree, you'll probably need a spotlight or a reflector & I don't think the monkey or the zoo will be too happy about it!

2) Depending on the situation you could try a graduated ND filter.

3) Accept that the sky will be blown out & correctly expose for the monkey.

4) Film a different monkey.

Unfortunately until camcorders have HDR video theres not much else you can do I'm afraid.

Hi Paul,

thanks for your reply.

Re point 1: apart from the monkey, maybe also the guards at the zoo might not like too much if I flash out the monkeys or other animals just to get the correct exposure :-)

Re point 2: were you considering a ND lens, or the ND filter?

4) Film a different monkey.


haha

If you are not able to increase the amount of light towards your subject there is not much you can do about it except blowing out the background. this is also a limitation of most camera which is dynamic range, filmcamera's like a Alexa can much better balance a harsh highlight and deep shade in the same frame while still retain detail in both

Re point 2: were you considering a ND lens, or the ND filter?
Tiffen 62mm Graduated 0.6 ND Filter 62CGND6 B&H Photo Video
That kind of ND filter!

But to be honest I agree with Noa in that there isn't really much you can do unfortunately.

In addition to the excellent points made already, you could try to get a tighter shot on your subject. My thought here is that you'll fill the frame with the subject and have less sky in frame. This assumes you were not already at the maximum telephoto end.

Hi Ricky,

unfortunately I was already at the max of telephoto...:-( but thanks anyhow :-)

P.S. I would have love a 20x zoom, but quality of the optics is perfect for my needs, thus in a couple of year or so I will buy a compact digital camera with powerzoom (20-30x) in 4K...when I go trekking and I "can compromise" image quality and ease of settings for just a compact powerzoom....

Its the same problem as shooting stills. with a dslr. If I shoot a wedding party indoors against a bright window (without much flash) you get horrendous haloing and lens flare around the edges of the subject. Same when shooting a bride walking down the aisle (photo or video) when the front door of the church is open on a sunny day.
I would suggest, going to manual, stop down the iris and increase the gain and/or shutter speed and add ND and fill the frame with the subject, thus reducing the amount of 'blooming' caused by the backlight.
Generally you want the sun behind your subject, but not right behind them.