As you are probably aware if you have read any of my articles I am not a fan of the automatic mode, as the camera just cannot think for you. When you are in the snow you are in an extreme lighting condition, with the bright winter sun reflecting off of the snow confuses the camera. In turn the camera thinks there is far too much light and underexposes the shot.  What you end up with is grey snow and dark faces, this is far from ideal and can really put a dampener on your winter holiday photography efforts.

How to produce a good shot every time

I am a big fan of exposure bracketing, and makes finding the best shot of the moment much easier. When you bracket expose you are hedging your bets and often results in finding the perfect shot.

Another way is to introduce some exposure compensation, I would try half a stop overexposed to a full stop +1EV overexposed this will often produce the clean white snow and people being correctly exposed. Sometimes when it is a very bright day you may find the snow has to be overexposed to allow for people to be correctly exposed.

Snow is a difficult lighting condition, but taking your camera off of automatic and using some exposure compensation will produce far better results. Consult your cameras manual to find out how to set up exposure bracketing, it is a technique I will refer to often and you will wonder how you lived without it many shooting conditions.

If you have any further advise for shooting in snow I would love to hear about it, add your comment today. Until next time happy snapping.

Photo credits intro photo by jaxxon