Do you see what I did there?

Yeah...sorry, I'll not do it again.

I mentioned about Dermot's tirade on the power of over-exposing by two stops when taking night pictures a few posts ago. Whilst I think he quite enjoyed being painted as some form of manic overlord (a position we all know is held by Louise - lets face it, anyone who can con her hubby into carrying her camera kit around like some sort of bag boy deserves the title...), I thought it was worth sharing some of my over-exposed examples with you to show what he means.

Now before I go on, I'm still not sure if its as black and white as I make him out to be. Yes a lot of pictures benefit from it, but sometimes the opposite is true. I mentioned white balance changing the look of the image and being a nice way to add warmth of flavour, well I think the exposure tweaking is the same. Over exposing certainly brightens things up, but sometimes a little darkness can leave it a bit more sinister.

Here, look at these rather formulaic (look mama - big words!) shots of Ha'penny Bridge in Dublin.

(8secs, f/8, focal length - 18mm, ISO - 100, 11/12/07 21:52)

(2secs, f/8, focal length - 18mm, ISO - 100, 11/12/07 21:52)

The first image is a nice, bright, welcoming shot of the bridge at night. The second is much more somber. I haven't changed anything about these. (Though they may get doctored real soon...)

I guess it's all about what you want from the picture at the end of the day.

Oh, Dermot put his photos of Dublin here. Colour me jealous. (I'm assuming he's happy for me to link to them?)