Shooting against a bright stage background

I’ve written about shooting outdoor productions as the daylight gives way to stage light, but here the set walls were painted with light colors, adding the challenge of shooting the actors against very light-colored walls. (The stage design reminded me of an Escher print, with its real and imaginary, black and white stair cases.)

The opening ballroom scene in daylight.

As the stage lighting takes over.

And with an opening night audience.

The performance is The Comedy of Errors, by the Sonoma County Repertory Theatre in Sebastopol, California, this month.

153mm, 1/125 sec, f/5.6, Mode: Av, Metering: Evaluative, Exp comp: -2/3, ISO: 640.

The sequence of un-edited frames shows the need for an on-the-fly exposure adjustments when shooting with a light-colored background and using aperture-priority exposure mode (Av). Above, a telephoto shot is underexposed, but detailed enough to be saved by a photo editor.

70mm, 1/250 sec, f/5.6, Mode: Av, Metering: Evaluative, Exp comp: -2/3, ISO 640.

This wide-angle image was taken with the same exposure compensation as the first image. Because more of the stage walls are included, the camera’s light meter read more light and sped up the shutter to compensate resulting in a darker image.

70mm, 1/60 sec, f/5.6, Mode: Av, Metering: Evaluative, ISO: 640.

Then I increased the exposure on this frame (zero compensation) so the camera would lengthen the exposure time to give the actors sufficient light.


Shooting against a light background simply requires overexposing your subject as in these images.

1/160 sec, f/3.5, Mode: Av, ISO: 640.

1/100 sec, f/3.5, Mode: Av, Exp comp: +1/3, ISO: 640.

How can you avoid constantly re-adjusting the exposure compensation? Use the camera’s program mode (P), and let the exposure automatically adjust for speed and aperture. In P mode you won’t be able to manually set the depth of field.

My shadow among the redwoods in Ive’s Park just before the shooting began.

And here is one of my favorites from the production.