Blown highlights are evidenced in the histogram as values off the right side of the scale. However, the histogram (and apparently the blinkies as well) in the *ist cameras describe the jpeg image. When shooting RAW, some highlights that might shown as off the scale can actually be accommodated. Thus, I look at the histogram as a guide, not an absolute. And of course there are situations where one might wish to include blown highlights for aesthetic reasons. Example: specular highlights on water.
Paul
On Dec 27, 2005, at 12:57 PM, Dario Bonazza wrote:

First, I agree that blown highlights can just be another way to show the right part of the histogram. However, that's not always true: just think of a bright sky in a corner of a backlit building almost filling the picture: the histogram could well describe the light distribution within the backlit building and you'll be fooled by a perfect histogram missing the sky (far right, outside the histogram scale).

In my opinion, the blown highlights should be tuned for "whiter than white" (i.e. any level outside the histogram, on the right). This way, they would perfectly complement the histogram and you won't risk to forget a bright area whose brightness is far above a nice balance of shadow levels (depicted by the histogram you are tuning with exposure).

However, I understand that in practice blown highlight could be tuned from very close to the right side of the histogram scale (I don't know which level) upward (no limits, of course), which is not bad either.

Dario

----- Original Message ----- From: "Kenneth Waller" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <pentax-discuss@pdml.net>
Sent: Tuesday, December 27, 2005 6:39 PM
Subject: Re: Survey: How do you use the Histogram/Blinkies?


I'm not too sure that you can tell if you have blown highlights from just the histogram.

Which raises an interesting question....
@ what level of over exposure are the blinkies turned on?

Kenneth Waller

----- Original Message ----- From: "P. J. Alling" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Survey: How do you use the Histogram/Blinkies?


I'm not too sure that you can tell if you have blown highlights from just the histogram. Since I've been using the Ds, (it has some nice points but I do miss the D), I've had the blinkies turned on with the histogram. I've gotten blinkies with what looks like a perfectly acceptable histogram.


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