Photography Help Needed

[Brennan's Mum]

I have an Olympus fe 320 Point and Shoot. It has 8mega pixels and I have had it for over a year now.

I keep it on the auto settings. My trouble is I have found that some of the photo's come out too dark no matter what the lighting was. The pictures look fine on the screen, but when I print it at the camera shop it is dark and it makes Brennan look darker then she is especially around the head. This is a worry as I would love to get a head shot of Brennan tattooed on me, but I do not want for it to be unrealistic.

I realise that DSLR camera's are better quality, but in this point of time a DSLR is just out of my price range or my skill range .

Has anyone got any tips/ idea's?

I am looking at upgrading my camera in the near future and am open to going with another point and shoot brand. I was kind of thinking of going with a Canon this time ( always had Olympus) because if I got a DSLR it would be a Canon.

What should I look for camera wise?

Sorry if this sounds naive

[kja]

How does the image look if you print it somewhere else? It could be the printer.

Please post an example so we can see if it looks too dark or not.

As for a new camera, what are your priorities & budget?

[persephone]

perhaps get it printed at a friend's place, or at another place?

OR.. if you can, adjust the pic to be printed on the screen... so it is a bit lighter, see how that prints out ? I print my own copies..don't print many ..but that way I can adjust them if needed. ( I only use a point/shoot camera, too )

Agree with kja.Put a copy up on here, and let us have a look

Also - have a look for Dju's thread about getting a new camera! Lots of info there

[Brennan's Mum]

Thanks will do the search for the thread.

Will have to wait until tonight to use the scanner.

Some photo's were printed at the photo store Rabbits? and the rest have been printed at Big W because the camera store shut down.

This is an example of the photo how it looks on the computer, and on my screen

[huga]

If you want a decent shot for a portrait, you need to take the shot outside in natural light (but not full sun), preferably with the sun behind you. Take it from eye level. Dogs with dark muzzles can be difficult, I have trouble with exposure on Lola sometimes because of her dark face and light body. The shot above doesn't look too dark, but you've lost some detail around the left eye. If you get a good shot but it's still too dark printed, try lightening it up in one of the editing programs and get it printed again.

[kja]

OK, yes, the face is underexposed and this will print dark.

Does your camera have anything other than auto mode? If so, worth learning how to use it so you can get a crisply focused and well exposed image to start with. A little flash would have helped this one, too.

Auto mode is easily tricked and it can be hard to get what you want.

There is probably a little play in the original file so you could go into Lightroom (or your program of choice) and lighten the face up a bit. Nothing you can do in post about the out of focus bit this time

Big W and the like can do very nice prints -it really depends on luck as the biggest problem with these places is consistency. Sometimes the print will be great, others bad. On the upside, they will reprint if you aren't satisfied - but you have to give them a good file. You can't take in a very under or over exposed image and expect the print to be right.

quick and dirty edit:

Edited October 19, 2010 by kja