your built-in camera meter just doing what it was designed to do--try to turn white (or black) objects as gray as it can.
This is not one of my photography classes I teach, so I'll just take a short cut and give you some quick tips (sorry, those of you with simple point and shoot cameras can e-mail me for some other options). First, assume that your meter will want to "gray down" that snow or ice scene. Now, are you ready for a counter-intuitive tip? Use your exposure compensation dial on your camera (you can find it in the index of your manual, or on the illustration at the front of your manual where it has arrows pointing to the features on top of your camera). Turn the dial so that you are overexposing, yes, overexposing the scene. Depending on how bright the scene is, and how much "whiteness" you see in the viewfinder, you will have to overexpose the scene by anywhere from 1-2 stops!!! What you're your actually achieving by doing so is getting a photo of white snow, which is what your eyes see.
In this first example, taken in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, it was sooooo cold and the scene sooooo white that I overexposed the shot by 1 2/3 stops! As you can see, I got white.
In this second example, of the ski slopes (a Steamboat Springs image that appeared in a Colorado calendar), it wasn't as tricky. Why? Because there was more color, other than white, in the viewfinder. Therefore, the built-in meter didn't think it had to underexpose the scene as much in order for it to give me gray. Nonetheless, I still overexposed it a bit--to 2/3 of a stop overexposure.
So, unless you live in southernmost United States, go out there and experiment. You're going to amaze yourself this winter!!! Have fun.
Shoot me an e-mail anytime--I love to share my expertise, experiences, and approach to my photo art.
Eli Vega, Photo Artist
www.elivega.net
vegaphotoart@gmail.com
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