I don't need a meter!

[Roger Hicks]

I disagree the subjective element is in the area selected, I can pick highlight or shadow dependant on film, conditions and artistic interpretation
From that point on everything is measurable and the meter is only being used as a comparator so need not be accurate itself it just needs to be consistent to maintain the systems integrity
I believe the 18% grey came out of the early movie industry’s need for consistency, Munsell’s theory when I did it 30 years ago made no mention of it

Dear Stewart,

The early movie industry had nothing that we would today recognize as meters -- but I am told (there are no doubt those who know more than I) that as soon as the SEI appeared in the late 40s/early 50s, it achieved cult status, and retained it for many years: some say, even to this day.

After all, in a movie, what you're trying to match from shot to shot is never a grey card, but (normally) the skin tone highlights of the star. The SEI made this (comparatively) easy. And Ansel Adams himself is alleged to have said that once be acquired a spot meter, his exposures increased by a stop.

Could you possibly enlarge upon the first paragraph? Highlight detail and shadow detail are easy, and relevant; 18% is neither.

Cheers,

Roger

 

[visiondr]

After thinking about this for a bit and re-reading Bill's (Mattock) comments, I believe he's correct.

In essence, he's saying that without a frame of reference (a sunny day, heavy overcast outdoor light, incandescent light indoors) we really can't measure exposure/ light with our eyes.

Consider this "test": Place the world's greatest "sunny 16er" in a room with six uniform surfaces (walls, ceiling, floor) and vary the light level and ask the "expert" to call an exposure value for the room. Oh, and make the light such that no shadows are cast (even of the test subject). I imagine, that without a frame of reference, he/she would become totally lost with a few changes in light levels. In other words, we really aren't light meters after all. We just remember situations where exposures have been correct in the past. In this case, the room is not a familar situation, the light levels are variable and there is not sunlight anywhere and no shadows.

That is NOT to say that we can't make totally valid calls on exposure some or even most of the time.

 

[Roger Hicks]

That is NOT to say that we can't make totally valid calls on exposure some or even most of the time.

Is anyone saying anything else?

And would anyone (except possibly Bill) deny that this is 'judging' exposure?

Cheers,

R.

 

[tripod]

After thinking about this for a bit and re-reading Bill's (Mattock) comments, I believe he's correct.

In essence, he's saying that without a frame of reference (a sunny day, heavy overcast outdoor light, incandescent light indoors) we really can't measure exposure/ light with our eyes.

Consider this "test": Place the world's greatest "sunny 16er" in a room with six uniform surfaces (walls, ceiling, floor) and vary the light level and ask the "expert" to call an exposure value for the room. Oh, and make the light such that no shadows are cast (even of the test subject). I imagine, that without a frame of reference, he/she would become totally lost with a few changes in light levels. In other words, we really aren't light meters after all. We just remember situations where exposures have been correct in the past. In this case, the room is not a familar situation, the light levels are variable and there is not sunlight anywhere and no shadows.

That is NOT to say that we can't make totally valid calls on exposure some or even most of the time.

In real world situations there is nearly always if not always such a frame of reference which makes judging exposure "by eye" possible.

 

[Sparrow]

After thinking about this for a bit and re-reading Bill's (Mattock) comments, I believe he's correct.

In essence, he's saying that without a frame of reference (a sunny day, heavy overcast outdoor light, incandescent light indoors) we really can't measure exposure/ light with our eyes.

Consider this "test": Place the world's greatest "sunny 16er" in a room with six uniform surfaces (walls, ceiling, floor) and vary the light level and ask the "expert" to call an exposure value for the room. Oh, and make the light such that no shadows are cast (even of the test subject). I imagine, that without a frame of reference, he/she would become totally lost with a few changes in light levels. In other words, we really aren't light meters after all. We just remember situations where exposures have been correct in the past. In this case, the room is not a familar situation, the light levels are variable and there is not sunlight anywhere and no shadows.




That is NOT to say that we can't make totally valid calls on exposure some or even most of the time.

thank the Lord 🙂 that it exactly.

 

[Sparrow]

Dear Stewart,

The early movie industry had nothing that we would today recognize as meters -- but I am told (there are no doubt those who know more than I) that as soon as the SEI appeared in the late 40s/early 50s, it achieved cult status, and retained it for many years: some say, even to this day.

After all, in a movie, what you're trying to match from shot to shot is never a grey card, but (normally) the skin tone highlights of the star. The SEI made this (comparatively) easy. And Ansel Adams himself is alleged to have said that once be acquired a spot meter, his exposures increased by a stop.

Could you possibly enlarge upon the first paragraph? Highlight detail and shadow detail are easy, and relevant; 18% is neither.

Cheers,

Roger

Roger, you are a bright guy, why the misunderstanding?

if the light’s good I use sunny-16

If the light isn't
I pick what I think is the mid-tone a scene
I meter it
I make a print where that area is 18% grey

if I have time I use an incident meter

is that clearer


PS there are at least three of us who know the truth now 😀

 

[Roger Hicks]

Roger, you are a bright guy, why the misunderstanding?

if the light’s good I use sunny-16

If the light isn't
I pick what I think is the mid-tone a scene
I meter it
I make a print where that area is 18% grey

if I have time I use an incident meter

Incident light meters are great for tranny but tell you nothing about shadows (exactly the same as grey cards).

Sunny 16 relies on both film latitude and geographical latitude; sunny 11 will often give better results, especially in harsh, sunny, southern light.

"I pick what I think is a mid-tone..." Why? No speed index is based on mid-tones and it tells you nothing about shadow values (neg) or highlight values (tranny).

And how confident are you that it is a Munsell mid-tone? My own belief is that there's more guesswork and inaccuracy, for most people, in trying to pick a mid-tone than in an informed guess at the exposure, without a meter.

Why not meter the darkest shadow where you want texture (neg) or the brightest highlight where you want texture (tranny)? Why pick a hard-to-guess mid-tone?

As you say, where is the misunderstanding?

Cheers,

R.

 

[Sparrow]

Incident light meters are great for tranny but tell you nothing about shadows (exactly the same as grey cards).

Sunny 16 relies on both film latitude and geographical latitude; sunny 11 will often give better results, especially in harsh, sunny, southern light.

"I pick what I think is a mid-tone..." Why? No speed index is based on mid-tones and it tells you nothing about shadow values (neg) or highlight values (tranny).

And how confident are you that it is a Munsell mid-tone? My own belief is that there's more guesswork and inaccuracy, for most people, in trying to pick a mid-tone than in an informed guess at the exposure, without a meter.

Why not meter the darkest shadow where you want texture (neg) or the brightest highlight where you want texture (tranny)? Why pick a hard-to-guess mid-tone?

As you say, where is the misunderstanding?

Cheers,

R.

I use a reasoned input a repeatable method to achieve a predictable outcome. Do you dispute that? or is it just obviation on your part?

 

[cmedin]

I use a reasoned input a repeatable method to achieve a predictable outcome. Do you dispute that? or is it just obviation on your part?

If I'm following this right, the question would be why you're stating it's valid to eyeball what's to be considered 18% grey, but not ok to eyeball the overall scene.

 

[Roger Hicks]

I use a reasoned input a repeatable method to achieve a predictable outcome. Do you dispute that? or is it just obviation on your part?

No obviation at all. It's your reasoning that's at fault.

What does a grey card tell you about highlight or shadow values?

A thought experiment. Two scenes, one with a contrast ratio of 8:1 (a misty day), the other with a contrast ratio of 800:1 (unusual, but far from impossible with 'double lighting' such as sun streaming through a church window and dark roof-beams).

Choose your mid-tone in both cases. At 8:1, latitude will take care of everything. At 800:1, you will need some means of controlling contrast, and if you are wise, you will also bias your neg exposure so you have some shadow detail or your tranny exposure so you don't blow the highlights. The grey card tells you NOTHING about tonal range.

So why not cut out the middle-man and meter either the shadows (neg) or highlights (tranny) and get the exposure right without a worthless grey card reading? Or meter both so you know how much fill/development reduction/Tiffen Ultra Contrast filtration to use?

Cheers,

R.

 

[Roger Hicks]

If I'm following this right, the question would be why you're stating it's valid to eyeball what's to be considered 18% grey, but not ok to eyeball the overall scene.

You're following it the same way I am. Or are we both missing something?

Cheers,

R.

 

[sirius]

Boy, and I thought Sunny 16 shooters were so zen... 😉

 

[andrealed]

Sometimes, when walking down the street, I'll take a base reading with a meter, set my exposure, and adjust it without another reading if the light conditions change. After an hour, I'll take another reading to see if I am very far off.

I wonder which category I fall into.

Best of both worlds.🙂

This is my way too, I call it "metering" if you have a meter, and if you don't have a meter and do the sunny 16 it's well..."metering" too, because "sunny 16" is a set of rules, that you have to follow regardless of your eye, just like using a meter. Using sunny 16 is following a set of rules that may or may not suit your eye just because IS a rule to follow.
Shooting "by eye" or guessing is absolutely different than using sunny 16.
In my Feininger manual on photography, Andreas says that guessing is by far the most useless thing to do for choosing an exposure. If you don't have a lightmeter, he says, please follow the chart in your film box, but don't guess. So it's clear that guessing and sunny 16 are totally different things.
Suuny 16 is based on the observation of the shadow projected on the ground, not on judging the intensity of the light, that is (and Bill is right), absolutely impossible to do because our eyes are not calibrated for it (thanks God...).
But we are capable of telling if a shadow is strong (16) weak (11/8) absent (5,6) and if we are in full shadow (4).
Sunny 16 is based on shadows indeed.

ciao
Andrea

 

[Sparrow]

If I'm following this right, the question would be why you're stating it's valid to eyeball what's to be considered 18% grey, but not ok to eyeball the overall scene.

because I only use my eyeball to asses the mid point of the scene (a comparative value) i then use a meter to set the exposure (an absolute value)

I can’t asses the absolute value directly by eye because the eye has an iris and therefor cannot accurately measure a light value, which is where we started 😀

 

[Sparrow]

No obviation at all. It's your reasoning that's at fault.

What does a grey card tell you about highlight or shadow values?

A thought experiment. Two scenes, one with a contrast ratio of 8:1 (a misty day), the other with a contrast ratio of 800:1 (unusual, but far from impossible with 'double lighting' such as sun streaming through a church window and dark roof-beams).

Choose your mid-tone in both cases. At 8:1, latitude will take care of everything. At 800:1, you will need some means of controlling contrast, and if you are wise, you will also bias your neg exposure so you have some shadow detail or your tranny exposure so you don't blow the highlights. The grey card tells you NOTHING about tonal range.

So why not cut out the middle-man and meter either the shadows (neg) or highlights (tranny) and get the exposure right without a worthless grey card reading? Or meter both so you know how much fill/development reduction/Tiffen Ultra Contrast filtration to use?

Cheers,

R.

Roger, are you missing the point or simply mudding the water? forget the grey card and your tiffen filters, unless we are talking LF here not 135, then read my last post

 

[Sparrow]

Best of both worlds.🙂

This is my way too, I call it "metering" if you have a meter, and if you don't have a meter and do the sunny 16 it's well..."metering" too, because "sunny 16" is a set of rules, that you have to follow regardless of your eye, just like using a meter. Using sunny 16 is following a set of rules that may or may not suit your eye just because IS a rule to follow.
Shooting "by eye" or guessing is absolutely different than using sunny 16.
In my Feininger manual on photography, Andreas says that guessing is by far the most useless thing to do for choosing an exposure. If you don't have a lightmeter, he says, please follow the chart in your film box, but don't guess. So it's clear that guessing and sunny 16 are totally different things.
Suuny 16 is based on the observation of the shadow projected on the ground, not on judging the intensity of the light, that is (and Bill is right), absolutely impossible to do because our eyes are not calibrated for it (thanks God...).
But we are capable of telling if a shadow is strong (16) weak (11/8) absent (5,6) and if we are in full shadow (4).
Sunny 16 is based on shadows indeed.

ciao
Andrea

that makes four 🙂

 

[Roger Hicks]

Roger, are you missing the point or simply mudding the water? forget the grey card and your tiffen filters unless we are talking LF here not 135 then read my last post

I must be missing the point: sorry.

You're the one who brought up mid-tones, 18% grey and incident metering. I'm happy to forget all of them, because they are irrelevant, except for incident metering for trannies.

Meter the shadows for neg, and the highlights (including the artificial highlight = incident) for tranny. What is wrong with this advice? And how does your mid-tone metering system come near, let alone do better?

As an aside, why can't you use Tiffen Ultra-Contrast filters on 35mm? Or still better, on digi? I sometimes do. So do cinematographers: they won Tiffen an Oscar, I believe, for technical innovation.

Cheers,

R.

 

[BillP]

No.

It's a 101 - post willy-waving competition.🙄

Regards,

Bill

 

[VinceC]

On my digital SLR, I often get better results shooting in manual with my own estimated exposures.

I've gone for long stretchs of time without a meter, doing a lot of shooting, sometimes professionally. I do think it's mainly a matter of experience.

Using 400 speed negative film with an assumed one-stop latitude, there are about 15 stops between the lower limits of hand-holdability (1/8 at 1.4) and the upper limit of light on earth ... 1/500 at f/22 in sunny sand or snow.

Experience, aquired through thousands of exposures, can give you an excellent idea of which of the those 15 exposure values to select.

Digital and slide film usually require the accuracy of an exposure meter, unless you're shooting in true sun conditions. I learned a lot about unmetered exposure when I started getting my unmetered RF cameras and used them to shoot Kodachromes while using the metered SLRs for black and white work-related shooting.

 

[visiondr]

In this thread I have read that:

Some guys use meters, and it works for them.
Some guys use sunny f16, and it works for them.
Some guys use a combination of meter and sunny f16, and it works for them.

I have NOT read that:

Meter users are unhappy with their results.
Sunny f16 users are unhappy with their results.
Combination users are unhappy with their results.

So what is this? A 100 post willy waving competition?

Dude, you hit the nail on the head.