What are the best Nikon D100 settings for Beach Photos?

I Have a Nikon 28 - 80mm lens with a cheap external flash. I need to take some photos at the beach for some seniors in 2 days but when i take photos its too bright.

Actually it should underexpose the beach, but it depends on where the exposure meter is reading.

Camera exposure systems try to meter everything at 18% or medium gray. This works most of the time, but a few times, when you have a predominantly white or black background, it will turn out gray.

A cool trick they do in a lot of photography classes is to take a photo of a white wall, then take a photograph of a black wall.

When you compare them, they both will be the same gray. The white wall will have been under-exposed to gray and the black wall will have been overexposed to the same gray.

But if you over-expose the white wall by +2 stops, or under-expose the black wall by -2 stops, they will turn out the correct white and black.

Bright scenes like a beach work like a white wall, so I'm surprised the beach is over-exposing.

There can be two reasons for this:

1. The sun is to the front of you, or at least the sun is bouncing off the sand.

2. Your camera is in matrix mode, which averages the entire scene; but again, this should result in a over-exposed photo.

Things to do for your shot:

First, read in your manual how to change your metering to spot metering. Then when you take the photo, put the spot on the subject. Then the camera should meter the exposure on the subject and disregard everything else.

And if all else fails, put your camera into exposure bracketing mode, which will take several photos in succession, with the exposure value at different values, both over-exposing and under-exposing the photo. Hopefully one of those will be the correct exposure.

You can also take an exposure, look at the results, then adjust accordingly. Either use the exposure compensation dial, or if you are in manual, simply change something for a reduced value.

Also, I don't recall if you have a histogram on your D100. I had a basic one on my D70. If you do, look at it when you take the photo. If the histogram "mountain" is centered on the scale, the exposure is correct. If the "mountain" is to the right, it's over exposed, and if to the left, it's underexposed. Normally there will be a center mark, and a 1/4 and 3/4 mark on the histogram. These marks should be 1 stop between them, but it can vary.

Anyway, practice before the big day.

http://www.althephoto.com

Too bright? Faces dark? Set camera to Auto and force flash to fire every time.