Do you underexpose your M8?

Exploit the medium

Exploit the medium

My understanding of the zone system is that you try and expose the negative so that the straight line section of the film response curve (toe/straight line/shoulder) will match the area of the light spectrum you are trying to extract the most detail from. Corrections are made in printing, or raw file
conversion. The zone system or "exposing to the right" is just a technique like dolby sound recording, to exploit the medium for more fidelity or artistic control.
 
Gabriel M.A. said:
No, I don't. You may want to, but I don't want my histogram "more to the right side". Not all scenes are 18% grey. Not for me with digital photography, anyway.
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I get the feeling you don't really understand the concept I'm talking about.
Here's a short section copied from the Luminous Landscape. The full article can be found here: www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/expose-right.shtml


"Because of this difference, setting up the exposure using an 18% gray card (as is typically done with film) does not work so well with a digital camera. You will get better results if you set your exposure such that the whitest white in the scene comes close to, but not quite reaching, the full digital scale (255 for 8-bit capture, 65535 for 16-bit capture). Base the exposure on the highlight for a digital camera, and a mid-tone (e.g. 18% gray card) for a film camera."
 
You want your histogram to reflect what you want your image to look like. Your meter is designed to read middle gray and Middle gray is not in the middle of the histogram, it's a little to the right. Meter off something black and it will reccoment overexposing, just like your meter will tell you to underexpose white snow.

Blanket statements like you want to your histogram to be to the right is only true if your scene is 18% grey. I sure as hell don't always want my histogram to the right, sometimes i do but more often then not it's not the case.

I think Gabriel actually understands the concept quite well...
 
emraphoto said:
i have always used the hand trick... meter in direct light and meter in shadows. commit to memory and go. i don't shoot the m8 under ever and it has been 100% predictable for me. i only really shoot people and have used m's for a very long time. i tend to agree with tmfabian

i have also found the ap mode very reliable in tough lighting conditions.

ap mode, zone focused, 40mm f1.4
http://not.contaxg.com/document.php?id=22876&full=1
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I have wondered why more camera cases were not made in 18% gray. ;-)

Regards, John
 
cmogi10 said:
You want your histogram to reflect what you want your image to look like. Your meter is designed to read middle gray and Middle gray is not in the middle of the histogram, it's a little to the right. Meter off something black and it will recommend overexposing, just as your meter will tell you to underexpose white snow.

quote]


I recently shot some darker rock formations, (columnar basalt), and I saw my images appear to be very overexposed, +1, +2 or so. I corrected the exposure to what was right for the subject, and the entire image, lighter areas and all, shifted very blue, like 😉, and this along with other concerns caused me to ship the camera in for repair.

I was not surprised the meter "saw" the scene incorrectly, just that the correction by as little as 1 stop seemed to make everything go a bit crazy?

I expected an M system camera to behave in the manner you describe.

I may have a spare Summitar.

Regards, John
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cmogi10 said:
You want your histogram to reflect what you want your image to look like.
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Agreed. I never disputed that.

cmogi10 said:
Your meter is designed to read middle gray and Middle gray is not in the middle of the histogram, it's a little to the right. Meter off something black and it will reccoment overexposing, just like your meter will tell you to underexpose white snow.
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Correct. I never said otherwise.

cmogi10 said:
Blanket statements like you want to your histogram to be to the right is only true if your scene is 18% grey. I sure as hell don't always want my histogram to the right, sometimes i do but more often then not it's not the case.

I think Gabriel actually understands the concept quite well...
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When it comes to digital photography it's a valid statement. How far to the right you go for each shot differs of course from shot to shot. Whatever is right/correct for the shot is best.
Going the other direction only invites inherited noise.

All I was saying is that his statement "... even better is to use the good old "palm of your hand grey card" technique to meter..." was great for shooting with film.
When it comes to digital photography this technique is not necessarily the best way to go about it. One should go for the highlights and not the middle ground.
 
I think we're all on the same page for the most part.
The "right of the histogram" is something that is good to keep in the back of my mind. Since I understand why, and I see you do too, you know when it's an appropriate rule to break.
One should go for whatever makes the final image the best it could possibly be, that's not always to the right of the histogram.
 
JohnTF said:
cmogi10 said:
You want your histogram to reflect what you want your image to look like. Your meter is designed to read middle gray and Middle gray is not in the middle of the histogram, it's a little to the right. Meter off something black and it will recommend overexposing, just as your meter will tell you to underexpose white snow.

quote]


I recently shot some darker rock formations, (columnar basalt), and I saw my images appear to be very overexposed, +1, +2 or so. I corrected the exposure to what was right for the subject, and the entire image, lighter areas and all, shifted very blue, like 😉, and this along with other concerns caused me to ship the camera in for repair.

I was not surprised the meter "saw" the scene incorrectly, just that the correction by as little as 1 stop seemed to make everything go a bit crazy?

I expected an M system camera to behave in the manner you describe.

I may have a spare Summitar.

Regards, John
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Hah well I can't explain that...and thanks but I got a good deal on one today. 🙂
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weser said:
All I was saying is that his statement "... even better is to use the good old "palm of your hand grey card" technique to meter..." was great for shooting with film.
When it comes to digital photography this technique is not necessarily the best way to go about it. One should go for the highlights and not the middle ground.
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Here's my not necessarily best way to go about it results. ISO-2500:


M8 + 50mm f/1.4 Summilux pre-asph E46 (ISO 2500)

Had I exposed for the highlights, the shadows would have been toast.
 
Gabriel M.A. said:
Here's my not necessarily best way to go about it results. ISO-2500:


M8 + 50mm f/1.4 Summilux pre-asph E46 (ISO 2500)

Had I exposed for the highlights, the shadows would have been toast.
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The M8 is well known for its surprisingly rich shadow detail. I'm sure if you would have exposed for the highlights (when shooting RAW/DNG! - and without blowing them of course) you could have easily recovered your shadows in post. Also, you would have less inherited noise as can be seen in top right corner. This comment, though, is purely based on what I can see in the small picture above - might be just a mix of RFF interface, linking from Flickr or what not.
 
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OK, someone set me straight here please...
If I take a photo with the M8 set on A, and it's a dark scene, I want it to come out dark. My M8 takes the pix (at 16 sec) as though it wants to render the image at 18% grey...so it comes out overexposed. I set the compensation to -1 and it's still overexposed. I finally set it to -3 and it looks somewhat like the scene on the LCD. Finally I set the exposure manually, (at 1 sec) and it looks like it should on the LCD (set to low).
Should I not match the LCD to my computer LCD as close as possible? Ideally, should not the camera LCD look like the scene, the camera LCD look like the file on my computer LCD, and finally look like the print?
 
Haans said:
OK, someone set me straight here please...
If I take a photo with the M8 set on A, and it's a dark scene, I want it to come out dark. My M8 takes the pix (at 16 sec) as though it wants to render the image at 18% grey...so it comes out overexposed. I set the compensation to -1 and it's still overexposed. I finally set it to -3 and it looks somewhat like the scene on the LCD. Finally I set the exposure manually, (at 1 sec) and it looks like it should on the LCD (set to low).
Should I not match the LCD to my computer LCD as close as possible? Ideally, should not the camera LCD look like the scene, the camera LCD look like the file on my computer LCD, and finally look like the print?
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A. Do not judge a picture by how it looks on the screen. That's a No-No. 😉
(Basically, M8 shows you a profiled jpg on a low-res screen. This does not match in any way the Raw/DNG file.)
B. Set your camera's menu to display the histogram. Preferably in RGB, plus clipping mode.
C. When you look at the screen, pay attention to that histogram. - If you must, only look at the picture as a reference for crop and composition.
D. Depending on what you shoot, you want your Histogram to be more to the right (bright) side. Without any clipping, of course.
(Later in post, you move Brightness values - Not Exposure! - a little darker to correct things.)
E. The M8 is particularly strong in the shadows (details can be easily recovered in post, without inherited noise!) and rather weak in the highlights. (Like most other digital cameras, simply because digital sensors work linear and not like film.)
F. Do not misunderstand 'exposing to the right' with overexposing. 'Exposing to the right' is nothing else but taking in consideration when shooting digital that you're working with a different medium than film. Which of course does react differently and hence needs to be treated accordingly.
 
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Thank you Harold. So if I take a number of photos, the only way to get to the original scene mood/color/tonal qualities for any individual photo is from my memory of the original scene and adjust in PP?
 
Haans said:
Thank you Harold. So if I take a number of photos, the only way to get to the original scene mood/color/tonal qualities for any individual photo is from my memory of the original scene and adjust in PP?
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Sounds like you're still thinking 'overexposing' where you would lose all the above listed qualities.
Remember, when you overexpose you lose data. Once areas are blown out there is no data left to rescue.
With making sure the histogram is moved more to the right side, you will not lose anything. It won't take away from the mood, colour and tonal qualities either.
On your display it will look like you overexposed but once the files are in your post processing machine, you'll notice nothing is lost or blown out. By simply adjusting the Brightness (if necessary the Black's as well), the histogram (so to speak) will be back where it should be.
 
Harsh burnouts at the highlights

Harsh burnouts at the highlights

drjoke said:
I have been underexposing by 1 stop on purpose to compensate for the fact that M8 appears to have less dynamic range on the highlight side. That way I don't clip highlights so often.
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Maybe it's just me, but I've had some shots where stark transitions between darks and whites have produced messy burnout artifacts. I use the recovery tool, too, but the artifacts need photoshop to cover up, otherwise they are painfully obvious. They look like the teeth of a comb.

The noise of underexposing doesn't bother me. I usually add some 'black' anyway in LR.
 
The "histogram to the right" concept comes from how a digital sensor records data. In the slide film world, the entire dynamic range of slide records data at the exact same fidelity. In the digital world, the highlight end of the dynamic range records with exponentially higher fidelity than the shadow end.

For example, if I shoot an 18% grey coffee cup at en exposure comp of +2, so that the histogram almost touches (but does not clip) the right hand side of the image, and then I underexpose the same image by 2 stops when I develop in camera RAW, I will have a higher fidelity image than if I just shot the coffee cup straight up with no exposure compensation.

I've actually tried this, and it really works.

There are, however a bunch of caveats to this:
1. It only works if you are shooting RAW - don't try this with JPEG
2. This cannot be applied to all scenes - If the scene has a greater dynamic range than the sensor can handle you need to make some choices. Ideally, you would expose so that the parts of the image where you want to retain detail are to the right. This can be a pain without a spot meter. You cannot tell this from the histogram - use the blinky "blown highlight" indicator to get a handle on what still has detail.
3. This makes image editing a bit of a pain. Everything looks overexposed until you process it in your raw converter.
4. Exposing to the right turns you into a "chimp" - continually looking at your histogram while shooting. I've come to accept that this is a necessary evil of the digital world so I've embraced my inner chimp.

Jon McCormack
www.jonmccormack.com
 
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