How to take readings with a hand-held meter?

[SolaresLarrave]

Now... How do you, pros and old-hands, do it?

My recently deceased MR4 meter used to be on top of my M3. Not all the time, but then, I knew that the angle of coverage was approximately 30 degrees. Most of the time, I got exposures as good as I get with a camera with a TTL meter.

Now... any tricks or procedures to know? What do you use more often, incident or reflected light? I know you meter reflected light off the subject, but how do you handle incident light?

To work on a scenario like this: you're leaving home at about 10:30 AM. The light is typically winterish, a bit flat. A quick reading on my lawn says it's a 1/500 at f4 (pretty intense but not by much; BTW, I use ISO 400 slide film). However, I take another reading off the opposite side and it says between f5.6 and f8. I settle to use f5.6, just to be on the safe side. I know that if I face a lighter area, I should close the lens either half a stop (to lelt's call it f6.5) or even more (f8 or f9) if the contrast is very marked. If I go into a shady spot, I use the same logic to open the lens from f5.6 to f4 or even a bit more. I've measured at this point enough to figure out a one or two stop difference in lighting.

Is this reasonable? Or should I meter incident light? If I did, do I aim the meter at my lawn, my home, the area that looks at the street? My body? The palm of my hand?

Thanks in advance! 🙂

 

[Dracotype]

Now bear in mind that I am not a professional, so judge accordingly. I like incident metering. There, now all you people who use the Zone System can shoot me 😀 . Just kidding.

The reason I say that is that incident always gives you the proper tones of the scene, without having to place them in any particular zone and compensating in the development stage. So long as you do it properly. The accepted method for taking a incident reading is to point the dome at the light source, not at the subject. You are essentially taking a reading of how strong the light is. I also happen to like incident because I can compare it with Sunny 16. Sunny 16 is basically incident metering without the meter, so I can know whether my meter is going wacky at some point. But I am sure someone here can give you a much better argument to use reflected readings. Hope this helps.

Drew

 

[Byuphoto]

I use inciden more than any other unless I am using an SLR. If you and the subject are in the same light you can meter where you are. Just hold the meter up and point at the camera. If the light on the subject is different you need to go to the subject spot and point the dome at the camera not up to the sky

 

[back alley]

this is just me...as i shoot most of my stuff in the city on the street, i aim the meter down at the ground and use that reading.
so i am it at the street, the concrete and just use that reading.

i usually meter both sides of the street, sunny & shadow, and just remember the readings and adjust as i go.

joe

 

[Zack]

Call me crazy but i think the zone system is easiest. Just meter you hand and set it on zone VI.

 

[SolaresLarrave]

I wish I could remember where I read this: that if you want a good metering, just take a reading off the palm of your hand and open the lens one stop.

I've tried it, but then, always, at the last minute, I do something like you do, joe: I meter on the sidewalk (not on asphalt, which, being black, would throw my reading out the window).

This is a revealing thread... so many styles! To a certain extent, I do as Roland does, only with the meter in reflecting mode.

My problem with the zone system... what does that mean in Sunny 16? 😕

 

[Dracotype]

My problem with the zone system... what does that mean in Sunny 16? 😕

What is confusing about it? 😀 Not that the Zone system isn't confusing already... 😀

Drew

P.S. Yes, I have read The Negative.

 

[f/stopblues]

This is something I've been playing with a lot in the past months, since I got an incident meter. If you're taking a refected meter reading off your palm and adjusting 1 stop (or whatever is correct..), you are essentially compensating for the extra light your hand is reflecting back. The 1 stop adjustment you make brings it back as if you were metering 18% grey in the first place.

Now if you did the same meter reading, but put an 18% grey card there instead of your palm, the reading would be the same as your palm plus 1 stop.

If you put an incident meter in your hand catching the same light as the 18% grey card was and take a reading, it will be the same as the reflected grey card, and the same as your palm plus 1 stop.

As for my methods, I shoot all black and white so have more leeway than color or slide. I take a reading for shadows and one in full sun and either keep both in mind or jot them down on my hand or a sticky note on the camera or something. The key really is to place the dome of the incident meter in the same light as what you want to correctly expose in your photo. For example on the attached picture, i was almost directly facing the sun. I knew I wanted the wall and the two people to be correctly exposed so I took an incident reading of the same light they were both in. I took the meter and held it backwards facing away from the sun. That told me how much light was hitting the back of the people. It ended up being about f/11 @ 1/250. If I had taken a reading straight from my camera looking into the sun it would have said something like f/16 @ 1/1000 or the like. The backround would have all been correctly exposed but I would have lost all detail in the people and the wall.

Sorry for the long post! I'm just excited cause I'm learing this stuff too 😎

 

[egpj]

A majority of the time I use the incident meter on my Sekonic. I only use the spot when shooting in a particularly dark area. Lately though I have been using the MP's internal TTL meter while shooting in really low light.

The zone system... I really do not go with that religously. I used to carry around a grey card with me all the time and meter off that in the same lighting conditions but that is so cumbersome. Really only good for those shooting large format IMHO.

As long as I stay aware of the deep shadow areas that may be present in the scene and compensate then everything turns out great. Even when dealing with slide film the incident meter has not let me down.

Glenn

 

[ChrisN]

You can download a manual for the Weston Master V light meter from this page - http://www.butkus.org/chinon/weston_exposure_meters/weston_exposure_meters.htm

It's a pretty good read for the metering techniques.

 

[rover]

Completely lazy......

I walk outside, take an incident reading with the meter facing the sun, another facing away from the sun and one in the shadows. I set the camera based on those three readings depending on my sometimes good judgement. I will take additional readings if I feel the light changes.

Inside, I meter the shadow area of a room when I enter and shoot. I process mostly in Diafine so I don't worry about the highlights that much. If there is a lot of contrast indoors I shoot with my M6. The M6 is smarter than me.

 

[taffer]

I'm learning as I read !

Truth is many times I forget to carry the meter or get lazy to get it out of the backpack. That said, many times I take a first multiple reading (usually for light and shadow, light coming from the ground, from an horizontal level and how much light there's in the sky) and more or less get an idea of how the values change in each position, then adjust accordingly during the shooting, if I remember 🙂

I mainly work with 400 ISO B&W film, so I admit I rely a lot on film lattitude. That said, film lattitude comes in handy, but it can't match a properly exposed picture.

 

[Pherdinand]

for most cases i keep the meter in incident mode horizontal, and the readings will be good (in your flat light situation).
If thereäs sunlight, naturally if i want to capture a subject in full sunlight i have to orient the meter such as its dome is in full sunlight; if the subject is in shadow, i put the meter in the shadow as well.
Reflected: wave it around the scene which you plan to capture and you get a contrast range; and in normal circumstances it should not be higher than 3 stops which fits very well on a negative, even on a slide. If there's the sun, a lamp or something, don't point the incident meter towards that, i mean, leave it out from the contrast range. If there's other very bright stuff like snow, sand, white buildings: depends again what you want to have correctly exposed. Don't be afraid to open up even two stops if you want a bright snow to be recorded as bright snow. The meter is a chicken, it's afraid of extreme situations.

And in general, don't be anal with metering. I used an old rolleiflex and slide film, velvia, kodak e100sw, with an incident metering used indoors, outdoors only occasionally when lighting changed, and almost all frames were correctly exposed when contrast was reasonable.

 

[Pherdinand]

By the way reading the answer of Taffer, i remember: happened a few times, i was really carefully metering, then calculating the correct exposure, but i simply forgot to transfer the settings to the camera itself. Bang! frames underexposed by five stops, black as a crow in the coal mine. And i always remembered that i made this mistake immediately when the shutter fired. Haoppened 4-5 times at least 🙂

 

[Andy K]

Another vote for incident metering.

 

[Joerg]

this is just me...as i shoot most of my stuff in the city on the street, i aim the meter down at the ground and use that reading.
so i am it at the street, the concrete and just use that reading.

i usually meter both sides of the street, sunny & shadow, and just remember the readings and adjust as i go.

joe

How I hate to agree with the authorities...... :bang:

But i agree with Joe dry concrete or asphalt is very close to the grey standard.
I fthere is blue sky I just measure the sky away from the sun 😎 I the adjust for shadow or direct sunlight with my poor judgement


Ciao

Joerg

 

[Nick R.]

I take incident meterings by pointing my meter at the camera with the meter in the same light as the subject. I keep a log of my shots with recorded f stop and shutter speed. I then compare to the developed neg. It is amazing how well this works considering I don't have a meter on my camera.
As someone mentioned, If you have time, metering for contrast is definitely worth it. It gives you the choice of what you want to over/underexpose.

 

[a.black]

Ahh, very interesting posts.
I just got a M4-2 and was surprised how good it feels not to pay attention to that internal lightmeter. I was even surprised that the first roll came out pretty decent, with just using my external lightmeter sporadically on reflected.
I guess I'll try some roles with metering incident.
First comes the joy of shooting almost independent (I never had more fun shooting, good the leica-feeling adds to that), but then one has to start thinking even more, with calculating exposure in the head.

But thanks for all those good infos, even tough I'm feeding of somebody elses question. 😀

 

[Ronald M]

I use incident unless I can`t get to the right light. Then it is time for a spot meter.

With an M6 or R, just pick what you want to render a middle grey. R has the advantage of a built in narrow angle setting or wider normal reflected.

 

[VinceC]

Incident meter, generally pointed toward the camera (or the opposite direction the camera is pointed, so the globe is receiving the same angle of light as the subject.

Actually, I shot 100 and 400 negative film for the past eight years with no meter and no missed shots (for exposure reasons). Once you've used an incident meter for awhile, you can get very good at judging the various permutations of sunny-16 rules (and, especially, its indoor variants).

Last month I finally knuckled down and bought a tiny Sekonic incident meter to replace one that broke nearly a decade ago. I'm relying a little less on film lattitude and am now a bit quicker in calculating exposure.

When shooting negatives, it's often good to open up a stop from the incident reading to bring out shadow detail. Or set the meter to 200 instead of 400 ISO.

I typically do one meter reading for the predominant light source in a scene, then just shoot. In open sun, I close down three stops for shooting in the shade and 1-and-a-half stops for sidelight. There are variations for different types of light. But usually Sunny-16 (or its seasonal variant, Winter Gloom-4) will suffice for all natural light conditions. A meter is mainly useful for indoors or other artificial conditions.

The reason I really like an incident meter is you're measuring the light itself, not the reflectance of the subject. So it's one quick reading and you're shooting and ignoring the meter, just adjusting the f/stops if you're going into or out of the shade. So I'm paying full attention to composition and the best f/stop-shutter-speed combo and not fiddling with exposure settings.