Possibly stupid newbie question...

[Ted Witcher]

Hello, all. I am brand-new to this forum and hoping to find an answer to my question. I am also new to actual film photography and recently acquired a G2 and some glass -- hey, right tool for the right job, my father always said. Anyway, this is what I'm a bit confused about: setting the proper aperture. I find the manual a bit vague, as if it is so rudimentary a topic (and it is, I must admit) that pages could not be wasted explaining it. When the camera is in full AUTO mode, I understand that the correct shutter speed for a given stop and ISO is automatically selected. Without using a light meter, how does one set the proper stop? Or is the camera designed to be used with a light meter? I assumed there was some onboard metering system, but then realized that the aperture ring on the lens would turn while in AUTO. So that made me wonder how -- even whether -- the camera could override the setting on the barrel. If it doesn't, and I don't think it does, the only way I can select a stop is to use a meter, right? Or guess.

Any help would be appreciated.

 

[Ted Witcher]

Thanks. But I guess my question is, what do I do after the camera is loaded, turned on, and switched to AUTO? How, specifically, do I arrive at the correct stop? Is there a meter readout somewhere that I'm missing (I just have the 21mm up at the moment)? I guess it's more a question of how does the metering system function. Even MANUAL mode is a bit confusing... to activate MANUAL mode, you select a shutter speed on the dial. Great. But which shutter speed? What is the specific process? Sorry about the questions, but I warned you this was newbie stuff...lol.

 

[Socke]

Thanks. But I guess my question is, what do I do after the camera is loaded, turned on, and switched to AUTO? How, specifically, do I arrive at the correct stop? Is there a meter readout somewhere that I'm missing (I just have the 21mm up at the moment)? I guess it's more a question of how does the metering system function. Even MANUAL mode is a bit confusing... to activate MANUAL mode, you select a shutter speed on the dial. Great. But which shutter speed? What is the specific process? Sorry about the questions, but I warned you this was newbie stuff...lol.

Yes, thats very very VERY newbee stuff 🙂

So just take it easy!

Set the aperture to something between 4 and 11, f5.6 should work in most daylight situations.
Then look at the bottom right in the viewfinder, where the camera shows the fraction of the exposure time, 1/250th is shown as 250, 1/30th is shown as 30 and so on.
Try to stay over 1/focal length, I.E. 1/20th with the 21, 1/50th with the 45 1/100th with the 90.

Aperture choice is easy, too. For group shots and architecture take a higher f-stop number, f8 of f11. For portraits take a lower f-stop number but take care that the focus is correct, again look at the bottom of the viewfinder if the focus indicator is in your area of focus. Say you try to shoot a head/shoulder portrait at 2m with the 90mm and the focus indicator is at 5m, then the camera focused on something else than your subject and the picture will be out of focus.

I have some pictures where a wall some meters behind my subject is in focus 🙁

An now go and burn some cheap rolls, listen to the AF motor, check distance and shutterspeed shown in the viewfinder and take notes with lens and f-stop and shutterspeed and picture number so you can see what you did when the pictures come back from the lab.

Don't be too depressed when the first two or three rolls don't have many keepers, learn from your notes!

 

[Ted Witcher]

Thanks for the help. My background is in motion picture photography, where the shutter speed (actually shutter angle -- it's a rotating mirror) is basically fixed, so there can't be any guesswork with regards to aperture. I see now that still photography is not like that.

Now the next question is, how do you expose for different areas of the frame? How do you choose to expose for shadows or highlights, for example? Do you have to use the bracketing function, or can you "get it right the first time"? Are the focusing brackets also where the camera is reading its exposure from?

 

[Flyfisher Tom]

Thanks for the help. My background is in motion picture photography, where the shutter speed (actually shutter angle -- it's a rotating mirror) is basically fixed, so there can't be any guesswork with regards to aperture. I see now that still photography is not like that.

Now the next question is, how do you expose for different areas of the frame? How do you choose to expose for shadows or highlights, for example? Do you have to use the bracketing function, or can you "get it right the first time"? Are the focusing brackets also where the camera is reading its exposure from?

It depends on your meter (some are weighted 60/40 (nikon/canon etc manual cameras), others are more spot meter-ish relatively speaking (leica), still others are matrix meters (nikon/canon auto SLRs). I have no idea what the G2's meter is like.

Assuming yours is a 60/40 (with 40% being the area inside the circle in your viewfinder), meter the highlights or shadows by:

1) using your feet to get closer to the area of interest so you isolate it for metering, than remember the setting or hold it (if your camera has AE memory).

2) use a longer focal length lens to zoom in on the area of interest, thus turning your meter into a pseudo-spot meter

Or, just get a handheld spot meter for the most precise measurements for situations where you absolutely need to expose for shadow/highlights accurately.

A great resource for metering questions is John Shaw's photography books. He goes through metering in great detail. good luck

 

[JohnL]

If you are shooting color or B&W negative film, you have plenty of latitude, except under very contrasty conditions (i.e. bright sun, deep dark shadows). Feel free to err up to one stop in iether direction. With slide film, you have much less latitude and must be careful not to burn out highlights. This is true with digital cameras too. The meter gives a camera setting that will make the average of what it saw through the lens a middling tonality i.e. shade of grey (or whatever color it happens to be). Check how much of the scene the meter covers. Not sure about the G2, but many RF cameras have meters that cover a circle in the middle of the scene that's about 2/3 the height of the short side or half the long side. So you need to know what you were metering. With slide film, highlights get blown when they are more than 2-3 stops brighter than middle grey. If you meter the highlights, then open up 2-3 stops, you should get them near the upper limit of a slide film's dynamic range. Does this make sense?

 

[Socke]

Read this:

http://www.fredparker.com/ultexp1.htm

 

[Ted Witcher]

Thanks, but... I was wondering about the G2 specifically (this is the G forum, I thought everybody here might be G1/2 users). Unless the answer is, you can't (without a light meter, that is). You take whatever the camera's average reading is, use the latitude of the film, and achieve whatever effect you're after in the printing. If you have a meter, that's one thing; but my take was that this camera was more for (or can be more for) off-the-cuff, street-style shooting. But perhaps it just doesn't allow for precise metering of specific areas?

 

[Socke]

Ted, what do you want from a camera?

Off the cuff street style like HCB or Winograd? They used unmetered manual focus cameras!

Full auto with the camera doing the thinking for you?

Sorry, this poor mid 90's camera is too dumb for this, you want a top of the line (digital) P&S with lots of scene modes.

With the Contax G2 you have to know what you do and what you want to achieve, then it is a great tool and delivers great quality.

The lenses are top notch and a bargain compared to others in this range, AF and motorized transport are more than usefull in most situations and where it's too loud or not acurate enough you better use something else.

Again, you have to learn to use it, it is you and not the camera who takes the picture.
The centre weighted meter is fine in all situations where a centre weighted meter is apropriate.

I use the G2 with slide film and it never let me down. But I know how to adjust incident meter readings for highlights and shaddows and when to use fill flash or refelectors to get the exposure I want for the subject.

If you don't want to learn exposure, get a Contax TVS or Yashica T4. Those are much better for full auto shooting.