Exposing to the Right (ETTR) - What is it and should you use it?
"Exposing to the right" (ETTR) is a photographic technique where the photographer intentionally overexposes the image to capture the maximum amount of light and reduce any noise in the darker areas of the image. The idea is to shift the exposure towards the right side of the histogram, especially when shooting in a digital format.
But does it really improve image quality, or does it just complicate your workflow?
This article provides a breakdown of the concept and discusses its pros and cons, and covers:
What is Exposing to the Right?
How do you Expose to the Right?
What are the advantages and disadvantages of exposing to the right?
Should you expose to the right?
What is Exposing to the Right?
When you expose to the right, you intentionally push the histogram towards the brighter side without causing highlight clipping.
The goal is to capture more data in the brighter areas, which can be beneficial in post-processing, especially when recovering details in shadows without introducing excessive noise.
It relies on the camera’s live view and histogram to get it right. You can read up on using the camera’s Histogram here.
How to Expose to the Right?
Turn live view shooting mode on.
Pull up the histogram on the back of live view.
Use the Exposure Compensation (+/-EV) Dial to increase or decrease its value until the histogram is touching the very right edge, without going over. You can find more about using the Histogram here.
After taking the photo re-check the histogram of the captured image on your camera display to ensure that the highlights are not clipped, meaning no information is lost in the brightest areas.
Advantages of ETTR:
Maximising Dynamic Range: By exposing to the right, you can make use of the full dynamic range of your camera sensor. This allows for more flexibility in adjusting the exposure during post-processing.
Reducing Noise: In digital photography, shadows tend to have more noise. By exposing to the right, you can later bring down the exposure in post-processing without amplifying noise in the shadows as much.
Simplifying Post-Processing: It reduces the need for exposure bracketing where multiple exposures must be merged in post-processing software like Adobe Lightroom or Photoshop. However, since you increased the exposure, you will likely need to adjust this during post-processing.
Disadvantages of ETTR:
Blown Highlights: One of the main risks of ETTR is overexposing to the point where highlights are clipped, resulting in areas of the image where details are lost. This can lead to irrecoverable loss of information, especially in bright or high-contrast scenes.
Extra Camera Work: Rather than relying on the camera’s automatic metering and exposure setting, you will need to use the camera’s histogram and exposure compensation mechanism to adjust the exposure and check that the highlights are not clipped. This takes extra time.
Requires Post-Processing: Since ‘ETTR’ images are overexposed, post-processing is required to correct the exposure. This can be time-consuming and may require advanced editing skills.
Handheld Images: Typically, you will increase your shutter speed to expose to the right, which may result in an unsharp image, if you’re shooting handheld.
Should you expose to the right?
While exposing to the right can be beneficial, it's essential to avoid overexposing to the point of significant highlight clipping, as this can result in the loss of detail in bright areas that cannot be recovered.
And are you really losing any image quality in the shadows if you don’t expose to the right? I did a field test to decide for myself if ETTR would be useful. I took two shots with my Canon EOS R5: the first image exposed to the right as much as possible without clipping the highlights in the waterfall, and the second image underexposed by 2 stops.
Image One: an image slightly exposed to the right without clipping the highlights in the waterfall as illustrated by the balanced histogram.
Image Two: the same scene underexposed by 2 stops by using a faster shutter speed as illustrated by the histogram.
I then increased the exposure of Image Two to match the first one during post-processing in Lightroom.
Image Three: The resulting image after increasing the exposure in Lightroom of Image Two to match the histogram of Image One.
I enlarged the shadow area of Image One and Three to 400% as a comparison, and the below image is what you see in Lightroom.
I concluded that there is no discernible difference in shadow detail between the two. So, my advice is to opt for low shadow detail over clipping the highlights when taking a photo.
This also takes into consideration that today’s noise reduction tools (e.g., Lightroom Denoise or Topaz DeNoise AI) are very good at removing noise from shadow details, but there currently isn’t any software available to restore lost detail in the highlights.
In a high dynamic scene, such as a sunrise or sunset, bracket your shots to create multiple images with different shutter speeds to ensure you capture the full tonal range without clipping the darks or the highlights, and merge them during post-processing (e.g., either as an HDR in Lightroom or in Photoshop).
Keep in mind that exposing to the right is not always necessary or appropriate for every situation. It could be useful in situations where you have sufficient time to check the histogram and adjust the exposure such as landscape photography using a tripod. Whereas it is not that useful for wildlife photography or other situations where you must quickly respond to changing scenes or conditions. It is a technique that you may choose based on the specific requirements of a scene and the desired outcome during post-processing.
Based on my experience, exposing to the right makes very little difference (if any) to the image quality if you use a recent digital camera.
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