Problem with camera?

[beryl the peril]

Hello, havent been on for a while but thought this was the best place to ask! Had my Olympus 410 digital for about 3 year and thinking back, cant remember having this problem so I guess it started several months ago. Im not sure if its actually me or the camera that is at fault. But the problems are that it seem to be producing 'too bright' pictures, creating a white sky, over exposing is maybe the right word. Ive noticed that on certain days, in certain directions, I cannot get a normal picture (it extremely bright) sometimes trying in another direction works. Im not sure if everyone who uses digitals have this problem or if its just me. Heres a couple of examples.

click to enlarge

http://img48.imageshack.us/img48/1647/tmpphppugtbylh7.th.jpg (http://img48.imageshack.us/my.php?image=tmpphppugtbylh7.jpg)

http://img93.imageshack.us/img93/6951/tmpphpexx4bslq4.th.jpg (http://img93.imageshack.us/my.php?image=tmpphpexx4bslq4.jpg)

as you can see, the colours look faded too.

would be grateful if anyone can shed any light on this problem
thanks in advance!

[Chris Hawkins]

Could be many reasons - including a faulty camera. One cause could be that you have the camera set to spot metering - I note that elements near the centre are correctly exposed. This would then blow out the brighter parts of the picture. In overall/average metering (eg Matrix) the camera would read all areas and make an intelligent guess - that is try to find a happy medium between highlight and shade. If it's not your metering setting, report back and I'm sure the forum will have another go! Cheers Chris

[tonymidd]

To really help we need to know the camera settings.

[beryl the peril]

Thanks.Im not sure what spot metering is, but can you tell me where to find it, then how do I alter that? Would just like to say... this problem doesnt happen all the time..I do produce some good pictures sometimes :grin:

I usually have the setting on -0.3...that seems to work best but I havent much idea about what setting to put it on either. Should the settings be changed for each picture taken?

[BarryM]

just having a look at the specs of your camera on the net.

I found steves reveiws has a load of info on your camera

at http://www.steves-digicams.com/2004_reviews/stylus410_pg3.html

gives u info on settings and well worth a read and a practise