I have a D70s and the histogram pretty consistently has a short range. The right side 25%-30% has very little image info and therefore I have to adjust levels on nearly every image. Is there something I am missing to get a better wider range in my exposures? Would using +- in exposure to adjust this be the way to go?

I better dealing with film.

Thanks for any input.

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The wide vs narrow range of the histogram is normally dependent on the scene you are shooting. EV compensation can move the whole block on one direction or the other. Changing the contrast settings (in camera or in post-processing) can do some shape changing of the curve.

Post an example and lets see what you are talking about.

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Joseph K
Seattle, WA, USA

D700, D200, D70S, 24-70mm f/2.8, VR 70-200mm f/2.8 II, 50mm f/1.4 D,
17-55mm f/2.8 DX, 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 VR, 18-70mm f/3.5-4.5 DX

I pulled up an example exposure in ViewNX2 and captured it and the histogram of course is a different look than on the camera back monitor, but it would give you a good illustration.

Now I can't seem to be able to attach my example. That feature is not responding to my click.

I did a few test exposures with the exposure compensation and +.7 fills out the length of the bottom line/axis.

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Your pic:


The histogram for this shot is mostly empty at the right third. This is to be expected for this shot since there are no light colors for that range in this shot. All the sky, dirt, and red create an accurate hump in the very center.

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Joseph K
Seattle, WA, USA

D700, D200, D70S, 24-70mm f/2.8, VR 70-200mm f/2.8 II, 50mm f/1.4 D,
17-55mm f/2.8 DX, 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 VR, 18-70mm f/3.5-4.5 DX

Thank you Joseph. It just seems odd to me that regardless of the subject matter the histograms are totally flat line for 1/3 of the image on the high end.

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Different subjects should certainly create different histograms. Please post some other examples.

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Joseph K
Seattle, WA, USA

D700, D200, D70S, 24-70mm f/2.8, VR 70-200mm f/2.8 II, 50mm f/1.4 D,
17-55mm f/2.8 DX, 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 VR, 18-70mm f/3.5-4.5 DX

Hi Foggy,

I have both my D70s's set at +0.7 exposure compensation with center weighted metering. When using Matrix metering I find it a tad too bright and with matrix metering I may drop the EC to +0.3 but, using RAW, I don't worry too much because of the ease that this can be
tweaked in post editing.

Regards,
Clive Liddell
Pietermaritzburg
South Africa

Thank you for the reply Clive. That seems to be the best general approach from my observations and tests. I plan to upload a few comparison examples soon.

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Well I haven't posted to the group before and I guess I have a few things to learn to make it work for me. I was able to upload a couple images to my gallery but haven't been able to post an image to the discussion for some reason.

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Hi Jay,

You have to keep the Width & Length below 1200 X 1200 and that file has to be smaller than 300KB. So you have to reduce it to upload it. Hope this help you out.

Bill

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Bill, thank you for the reply. All of a sudden I am getting an
option dialogue box for posting attached image files that I
did not get earlier or it was hiding behind the window I was
looking at.

Again, thank you.

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That window has a bad habit of hiding behind others. I've lost it countless times!

_____
Brian... a bicoastal Nikonian and Team Member

My gallery is online. Comments and critique welcomed any time!