I don't need a meter!

[fbf]

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.

I would love to hear about how you shoot slides or DSLR w/o meter. I am pretty much 95% relying on meter when using DSLR or shooting slides with SLR. I got pretty good exposure most of the time but it does slows things down like someone else mentioned here.

 

[VinceC]

>>I would love to hear about how you shoot slides or DSLR w/o meter.<<

It's really because I haven't mastered the in-camera meter. I'm more comfortable using an incident meter to verify estimated exposures. I have a Nikon D40 and love it for its small size and the fact that it can take old SLR Nikkors and mount them unmetered. However, I run into a lot of situations -- backlight, side-light -- where the matrix metering on the D40 with its kit lens creates very dark scenes.

 

[Sparrow]

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.

Roger you are arguing against a case I am not making, I am not saying any one method is better than another, what I am saying is this:

You say you can measure the light intensity by eye and I say you cannot, you can only make a judgment by eye.

I say any system that actually measures the light intensity must have a meter involved at some point.


How that measurement is taken or subsequently employed is irrelevant, so please don’t confuse the issue by veering off into esoteric filters or obscure colour theory. I believe that is what Bill was saying and that he is correct in his view.

regards

 

[Roger Hicks]

Roger you are arguing against a case I am not making . . .

Dear Stewart,

And you are arguing against a case I am not making.

I do not maintain that you can measure the light intensity by eye, nor would I dream of saying so.

I do maintain that you can very often judge exposure surprisingly accurately by eye, based on numerous memories of lighting and subjects.

If this sounds like hair-splitting to you, go back to the original few posts.

The OP said, "I don't need a meter"

Several people agreed.

Bill came in with a post saying, in effect, that you can't judge exposure, based on a highly personalized definition of 'judge'.

The principal point I have attempted to make is that surprisingly often, you CAN judge the correct exposure, using any normal definition of the word 'judge'.

A secondary point is that if you are going to use a meter -- which is an excellent idea, whenever you have time or unless you don't feel like it -- you might as well learn to use it properly, and to understand how film speeds are determined.

This means metering shadows for neg, highlights for tranny, and if you want to get clever about it, subject brightness range (I don't remember 'obscure colour theory').

Metering mid-tones (your suggestion, not mine) means relying on experience, fudging and latitude, which my suggestions do not. If you are happy guessing at mid-tones, fine. I'm not. I'm happier guessing at exposures. But we're both using experience, NOT science, at this stage of the game. The fact that you then meter what you guess to be a mid-tone does not negate your earlier guesswork.

Which bit of the above do you disagree with?

Cheers,

R.

 

[Roger Hicks]

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

Dear Pitxu,

I don't know why you're waving your willy, but the reason I'm risking frostbite in mine is simple. A lot of people don't understand metering or film speeds, and many of those who think they do are deluding themselves: they are being saved by the very considerable latitude in pos/neg photography.

It took me a while to see through a lot of the posturing on metering (and on 'sunny 16'), and all I'm trying to do is to stop others being taken in.

Those who get the best pictures, both technically and aesthetically, are often those like your chum who cheerfully combine metering and experience without getting obsessive about it. But if you are going to get obsessive, or if you simply want to understand the theory behind metering, it's worth getting it right -- which rules out mid-tones and embraces subject brightness ranges.

Then, when you do understand it, if you have any sense, you will go back to not worrying too much.

(Of course I use 'you' in the general sense, not you personally).

Cheers,

R.

 

[Sparrow]

Dear Stewart,

And you are arguing against a case I am not making.

I do not maintain that you can measure the light intensity by eye, nor would I dream of saying so.

I do maintain that you can very often judge exposure surprisingly accurately by eye, based on numerous memories of lighting and subjects.

If this sounds like hair-splitting to you, go back to the original few posts.

The OP said, "I don't need a meter"

Several people agreed.

Bill came in with a post saying, in effect, that you can't judge exposure, based on a highly personalized definition of 'judge'.

The principal point I have attempted to make is that surprisingly often, you CAN judge the correct exposure, using any normal definition of the word 'judge'.

A secondary point is that if you are going to use a meter -- which is an excellent idea, whenever you have time or unless you don't feel like it -- you might as well learn to use it properly, and to understand how film speeds are determined.

This means metering shadows for neg, highlights for tranny, and if you want to get clever about it, subject brightness range (I don't remember 'obscure colour theory').

Metering mid-tones (your suggestion, not mine) means relying on experience, fudging and latitude, which my suggestions do not. If you are happy guessing at mid-tones, fine. I'm not. I'm happier guessing at exposures. But we're both using experience, NOT science, at this stage of the game. The fact that you then meter what you guess to be a mid-tone does not negate your earlier guesswork.

Which bit of the above do you disagree with?

Cheers,

R.

Well Roger we don’t disagree at all it seems, but could you explain why an exposure using sunny-16 remains the same for both print and transparency, but needs to be adjusted for film type if it’s metered?

For your information I meter off the perceived mid-tone because that is what an incident reading is, that’s what a grey card is forI believe; you measure the light source bounced off a surface with a known (or in this case perceived) absorption at a particular angle to get a value. I am surprised you’d not come across that, it’s in the blurb that comes with the cards

regards

 

[Roger Hicks]

Well Roger we don’t disagree at all it seems, but could you explain why an exposure using sunny-16 remains the same for both print and transparency, but needs to be adjusted for film type if it’s metered?

For your information I meter off the perceived mid-tone because that is what an incident reading is, that’s what a grey card is forI believe; you measure the light source bounced off a surface with a known (or in this case perceived) absorption at a particular angle to get a value. I am surprised you’d not come across that, it’s in the blurb that comes with the cards

regards

Dear Stewart,

For the first, it doesn't remain the same. Consider a brightly lit scene with deep shadows. 'Sunny 16' will normally give you a good or very good exposure with tranny, but with neg, 'sunny 11' will often be more pleasing. For that matter, with a brilliant, light subject (a whitewashed house in Greece, for example), you may get a happier result on tranny with 1/2 stop less.

For the second, flatly no. A PERCEIVED mid-tone means absolutely nothing. You're back to guesswork: you are choosing what you think is a mid-tone.

A grey card, correctly used, is an adequate (but not good) substitute for an incident light reading. The old name for incident light readings, the 'artificial highlight', gives the game away.

A few moments' thought will reveal that an incident reading (especially the 'cardioid' reading from a Weston Invercone) is unlikely to be identical to a reflected light reading, though it will normally be close enough that the discrepancy is irrelevant -- which makes something of a mockery of 'accuracy'.

A few moments' more thought may suggest that the angling of the card is a 'fudge' to compensate for this, and also to compensate for the fact that the 'average' scene reflectance is 12-14%, not 18%. (EDIT: corrected from typo '16%')

I should appreciate if if you do not make quite such ungenerous assumptions about what I do and do not know, as I have spent some time trying to trace the history of the grey card: the furthest I have got is a wartime Kodak Dataguide, where a Kodak-yellow film packet is recommended as a starting point for exposure metering indoors with colour film.

I should not be surprised if you did not know about the history of grey cards and indeed the history of exposure theory, but equally, I would not be so patronizing as to say, "I am surprised you do not know that" about grey cards, when anyone who knows anything about the subject might be expected to know what you are talking about.

Cheers,

Roger

 

[Roger Hicks]

A word of advise to my freind Sparrow.

It's no use knocking if there's no one home.

Dear Richard,

Very true. There may however be some value in trying to explain things to people who don't understand them, or discussing them with people who have a different view. Some who are reading the thread may be interested in learning some basic exposure theory.

Which is what Stewart and I are trying to discuss. You, on the other hand, seem to be succumbing once again to your weakness for personal attacks without adding anything to the discussion.

Cheers,

Roger

 

[Sparrow]

Dear Stewart,

For the first, it doesn't remain the same. Consider a brightly lit scene with deep shadows. 'Sunny 16' will normally give you a good or very good exposure with tranny, but with neg, 'sunny 11' will often be more pleasing. For that matter, with a brilliant, light subject (a whitewashed house in Greece, for example), you may get a happier result on tranny with 1/2 stop less.

For the second, flatly no. A PERCEIVED mid-tone means absolutely nothing. You're back to guesswork: you are choosing what you think is a mid-tone.

A grey card, correctly used, is an adequate (but not good) substitute for an incident light reading. The old name for incident light readings, the 'artificial highlight', gives the game away.

A few moments' thought will reveal that an incident reading (especially the 'cardioid' reading from a Weston Invercone) is unlikely to be identical to a reflected light reading, though it will normally be close enough that the discrepancy is irrelevant -- which makes something of a mockery of 'accuracy'.

A few moments' more thought may suggest that the angling of the card is a 'fudge' to compensate for this, and also to compensate for the fact that the 'average' scene reflectance is 12-14%, not 18%. (EDIT: corrected from typo '16%')

I should appreciate if if you do not make quite such ungenerous assumptions about what I do and do not know, as I have spent some time trying to trace the history of the grey card: the furthest I have got is a wartime Kodak Dataguide, where a Kodak-yellow film packet is recommended as a starting point for exposure metering indoors with colour film.

I should not be surprised if you did not know about the history of grey cards and indeed the history of exposure theory, but equally, I would not be so patronizing as to say, "I am surprised you do not know that" about grey cards, when anyone who knows anything about the subject might be expected to know what you are talking about.

Cheers,

Roger

I see so sunny-16 is just a guideline you’re saying, not a rule it still needs to be qualified by your judgments, just as I must guess my perceptual mid-grey? by the way, why even after forty-odd years has my view remained a guess whereas you have developed judgment? Odd that

Clearly I have been mislead by Kodak, they are labouring under the mistaken belief that their card is an “A standard reference for exposure evaluation and grading.” and I took that at face value, it must be pure coincidence that my Studio Deluxe returns the same readings as the card.

I’m sorry if I offended you, not my intention, but I am sure you’d agree no one is so knowledgeable that their word should be considered beyond question? And would respectfully ask for you to show the same courtesy to others, and not denigrate their views.

 

[varjag]

Clearly I have been mislead by Kodak, they are labouring under the mistaken belief that their card is an “A standard reference for exposure evaluation and grading.” and I took that at face value, it must be pure coincidence that my Studio Deluxe returns the same readings as the card.

So it is indeed a substitute for incident metering if you only have a reflective meter? Well, that was part of Roger's point.

The guesswork comes into play when you meter off "middle gray" (as you perceive it) in the scene, not off gray card.

 

[Tuolumne]

I wish you guys would stop saying "tranny". It sounds so...well...lewd. :angel:

/T

 

[Sparrow]

So it is indeed a substitute for incident metering if you only have a reflective meter? Well, that was part of Roger's point.

The guesswork comes into play when you meter off "middle gray" (as you perceive it) in the scene, not off gray card.

Yes I accept that is guesswork, what I am saying is that I am comparing the lightest part to the darkest part of the scene to guess what part of the scene is the mid-point, I have a frame of reference, it is an informed guess and I can do it in any light.

Sunny-16 is fine down to 5.6 beyond there I find it gets increasingly problematic, and as Roger says it still needs qualifying for other factors anyway

 

[Toby]

This how I read this debate. When someone talks about shooting about a meter I don't think it's about judging light so much as to free oneself from getting bogged down in the technicalities of photography, and trying to be a bit freer in you photography. I'm pretty sure that there are no sunny 16 shooters here that literally own no kind of light meter. That in itself must say something about the limited uefulness of the system. But I never thought it was about that I thought it was about that. I thought it was about thinking about other things (like composition or the moment) and letting that take primacy in your work.

Getting bogged down in the technical side of photography gets you nowhere as this thread shows.

 

[Sparrow]

I agree completely Toby, I point the lens at some tarmac, in shade for print in sunlight for slide, set the exposure and get on with it, or I use sunny-f16
It only gets complicated in the explanation

 

[ferider]

We all know it's easy to take a lousy photo of a good subject. Well - at least I do ...

Besides the subject/vision, the photographer has only so many tools to express her/himself:

composition, focus + DOF, and exposure/zone selection.

That's it.

Why neglecting any of the three ?

Let's all use Sunny-16 at f64 from the hip ....

 

[Roger Hicks]

I see so sunny-16 is just a guideline you’re saying, not a rule it still needs to be qualified by your judgments, just as I must guess my perceptual mid-grey? by the way, why even after forty-odd years has my view remained a guess whereas you have developed judgment? Odd that

Clearly I have been mislead by Kodak, they are labouring under the mistaken belief that their card is an “A standard reference for exposure evaluation and grading.” and I took that at face value, it must be pure coincidence that my Studio Deluxe returns the same readings as the card.

I’m sorry if I offended you, not my intention, but I am sure you’d agree no one is so knowledgeable that their word should be considered beyond question? And would respectfully ask for you to show the same courtesy to others, and not denigrate their views.

Dear Stewart,

I apologize if you feel that I have denigrated your views, and I have no intention of trying to speak ex cathedra.

"A standard reference for exposure evaluation and grading" is not the same as "will produce identical readings under all circumstances to an incident reading," which I think you will find is what I said.

Yes, I use a grey card as an exposure reference when shooting colour neg under controlled lighting for professional (out of my control) printing or photomechanical reproduction. Quite close to what Kodak suggests.

But I do not pretend that it is a particularly good way of determining exposure, because it is an inferior substitute for incident light metering for transparencies (Tuolumne note -- sorry about 'tranny') and no substitute at all for shadow readings with negatives, unless you want to rely on limited subject brightness range, film latitude, or deliberate overexposure to get you out of trouble.

Do not become so excited about the difference between guesswork and judgement. I said I could 'guess' exposure in the same sentence (in post 109) where I said you could 'guess' a mid-tone. Your pretended attack on my arrogant 'judgement' versus your humble 'guesswork' is thereby demonstrated as valueless: in the context, 'guess' and 'judge' are interchangeable

The difference is that you (?invariably) base your meter reading on a guess/judgement of what is a 'mid-tone', and I (sometimes) base my exposure on a guess/judgement without using a meter. I'm admitting I'm guessing/judging; you're not. Eugene nails this one in post 117.

I really do not care very much whether you believe me or not, because it isn't a question of belief. I am writing for those who, if I did not present my view, might think that you have points I cannot answer. You have not.

Some may think I am wrong; some may not understand me, for one reason or another. But I genuinely do not believe that I have written anything misleading or wrong in this thread, and I hope that some people may have a better understanding of exposure theory as a result of some of the things I have written.

Cheers,

Roger

 

[PVia]

Erring on the side of one stop overexposure because most films respond well to that (finer grain) and keep a lot of information in their highlights, here are two guidelines that I've found useful when shooting indoors:

ISO 400
subject well lit by incandescent light: f2 1/30
flourescent light (and diffused window light): f2.8 1/60

Try it! I hope that' useful!

I agree with this...I shoot all negative film at half the rated ISO, so Sunny 16 becomes the same f-stops, only now shot at 1/250 for 400 ISO film.

Of course, these are all rough guides and work very well for neg film, however, as you all know, transparencies need a much, much more accurate method. It would be good training to go around and judge trannie film without a meter, if only for the heck of it. OTOH, I could take all my large format trannie shots, look at the trannie and the exposure record and see where all the types of lighting have fallen, and then internalize that info. Of course, each camera and shutter is different and many would do much testing before assuming a personal ISO, but in general, there's no reason not to try.

If these were once in a lifetime photos of a special trip or event, well, I'd rather rely on the meter, but for general shooting...

Another thing is, if you shoot in the same place much of the time, like workplace, your living room, etc, you can meter once and memorize it. Very easy to do, and once you do that, your shooting can be very spontaneous without stopping to meter...

And don't forget that overexposure with neg film is usually better than underexposing. The latitude can handle it easily...

 

[Roger Hicks]

Getting bogged down in the technical side of photography gets you nowhere as this thread shows.

Seconded. IF you bother to get into this in depth -- which I did because of what I do for a living -- then the only rational response afterwards is to go back to 'whatever works, works'.

But if you want to get into it, it's worth getting into it properly. One of the best overviews is Dunn's book on exposure meters: over 50 years old, but the basic physics doesn't change much.

What is not a good idea is to say, "This rule of thumb, which works for me, is the basis of sensitometry."

Cheers,

Roger

 

[Sparrow]

Dear Stewart,

I apologize if you feel that I have denigrated your views, and I have no intention of trying to speak ex cathedra.

"A standard reference for exposure evaluation and grading" is not the same as "will produce identical readings under all circumstances to an incident reading," which I think you will find is what I said.

Yes, I use a grey card as an exposure reference when shooting colour neg under controlled lighting for professional (out of my control) printing or photomechanical reproduction. Quite close to what Kodak suggests.

But I do not pretend that it is a particularly good way of determining exposure, because it is an inferior substitute for incident light metering for transparencies (Tuolumne note -- sorry about 'tranny') and no substitute at all for shadow readings with negatives, unless you want to rely on limited subject brightness range, film latitude, or deliberate overexposure to get you out of trouble.

Do not become so excited about the difference between guesswork and judgement. I said I could 'guess' exposure in the same sentence (in post 109) where I said you could 'guess' a mid-tone. Your pretended attack on my arrogant 'judgement' versus your humble 'guesswork' is thereby demonstrated as valueless: in the context, 'guess' and 'judge' are interchangeable

The difference is that you (?invariably) base your meter reading on a guess/judgement of what is a 'mid-tone', and I (sometimes) base my exposure on a guess/judgement without using a meter. I'm admitting I'm guessing/judging; you're not. Eugene nails this one in post 117.

I really do not care very much whether you believe me or not, because it isn't a question of belief. I am writing for those who, if I did not present my view, might think that you have points I cannot answer. You have not.

Some may think I am wrong; some may not understand me, for one reason or another. But I genuinely do not believe that I have written anything misleading or wrong in this thread, and I hope that some people may have a better understanding of exposure theory as a result of some of the things I have written.

Cheers,

Roger

Dear Roger

Please don’t be concerned for my feelings, as you I don’t take debate to be personal attack but rather a way of arriving at the truth,

I understand the purpose of a reference, and a grey card is just that when used correctly I would contend

I accept that when I select a perceptual mid-point I am guessing it, but and this is the nub of it, I am doing so within a frame of reference, I am making a comparison between the lightest and darkest area scene and selecting that point, it is repeatable under any conditions and yields a result that varies in line with those conditions.

I cannot see how the same can be said for your judgment using sunny f16, you have nothing to base your judgment on when there is no sunlight, or when the sunlight is not its normal value, you have already agreed that you cannot find an absolute light value by eye.

I also write simply to present my view so I am not misunderstood by others

Regards

 

[VinceC]

>> I'm pretty sure that there are no sunny 16 shooters here that literally own no kind of light meter.<<

I guess you're right. After my meter died, I went about four years of frequent shooting (negative film) without one, then bought a small Gossen handheld. Alas, a year ago, I left it in a pocket an ran it through the wash. However, a month ago, I finally got around to replacing it so that I could accurately meter the unmetered old lenses that I mount on my Nikon D40.

I confess that one of the reasons I shoot so much without a meter is to maintain that skill. About 75 percent of my RF photos are without a meter. But true, I do carry the meter for those tricky situations.