Is it possible.....

..to get a picture of the reading on a "backlit" digital scale??? Or would I be better off just buying a new dang scale?

It never occurred to me when purchasing my gram scale that the cool-looking blue backlit readout would cause me so much of a headache.

You should be able to. What all ways have you tried?

I am just trying to figure out what the problem could be. Could you post a sample image? Is it the flash that is causing the problem?

Or is it that the light output of the backlit display is not bright enough to capture on the same frame as a normally lit scene.

There is always a way, but not all are easily accomplished.

Well, if I use the flash, it seems to reflect, and if I go without flash, all you see is the bluish backlight on the readout of the scale, the numbers don't show up. I'll have to look and see if I have any pics saved that I could post for an example....my daughter has my camera at school for a photography class, lol.

This is one without flash......everything else seems to look really dark, and then all you can see is the light on the display. I can't find any other pics that I didn't get mad and delete, lol.

Originally Posted by Cat_72

This is one without flash......everything else seems to look really dark, and then all you can see is the light on the display. I can't find any other pics that I didn't get mad and delete, lol.

Time to ditch the scale. LOL!!!!

I would suspect that the display is just too light to get exposed properly in the total image. This is a CONTRAST problem. From the motion blur of the snake, it appears that the shutter speed is real slow, which means that while the camera is trying to get a correct exposure for the TOTAL image, that bright area of the scale's display just overexposes. It is VERY difficult to get an extremely broad range of light and dark areas to expose correctly in the same image. In that particular photo, you have to choose which part of it needs to be in correct exposure. Obviously, both the snake and the scale's display can't BOTH be correctly exposed.

So you have two options you need to try: (1) Use some external light source to make the snake itself brighter with additional light, or (2) make the display on the scale darker.

For number (1), an on-camera flash probably won't cut it, because the flash will make the entire image brighter, including the display on the scale. You will need some sort of spot source light to be directed ONLY on the snake itself.

For number (2), have you tried taking a photo of the scale display itself in such a way that it fills the entire screen on the camera? If you do this, the auto exposure in the camera will try to make that area correctly exposed and verify that the display CAN be photographed. Ever try to take a photo of a TV screen or computer monitor? That is when you discover what "interlacing" means for a display.

Does the scale have an adjustment for the brightness of the display? If not, you may be able to do this yourself by using layers of a darker film laid over top of the display.

Now this may sound non intuitive, you need to make the scale display DARKER in order for it to show up in the photo. You need to reduce the CONTRAST between the lightest parts and the darkest parts of the total image to keep from blowing out the image of the scale's display.

Hope that helps.

Thanks Rich, that was indeed very helpful. The scale does not have any way to adjust the brightness of the display, I may have to try experimenting with putting something like a piece of window tint over the display and see if that works.

If not, Bill's idea may be my next option, lol.

Thanks for the help!