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nickchew

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Hi all

I thought it might be nice if we could share how we meter a scene, with the quirks of different cameras.

For a start, how would you meter this scene. Obviously an incident meter would be best, but without that...

Please specify the camera you are using so we can compare differences.

For me, I interrupted her (not the best idea but...), moved close with an M6 & 35mm, metered (selective obviously) her face and half stop over exposed (because she is a bit fairer than 18% grey!)

I'd like to hear how others would do it with Leica Ms, Bessa Rs, Contax Gs and others.

Thanks

Nick
 
I think that "by the book" you did the right thing, metering her face; but practically, you may not want to get on your subjects' faces all the time to meter them --it's a bit intrusive.

If I really didn't want to get noticed, at least as much as possible, for the way you framed this it is very simple: meter right in the middle in the scene. You have the highest and darkest areas right there. If you want to get a bit more detail on the shadows, perhaps overexpose by about 1 stop; if you want only her face to stand out, then leave as-metered.

As you meter with the M6, you can see the LEDs change without having to put the viewfinder right up on your eye. This allows you to be discreet. With the amount of light you have there you may also pre-focus. Then if you must frame "properly" and need to put your camera up to your eye, it's all set and ready to fire (compose quickly and fire).

That's how I'd do it anyway.
 
I would probably have metered her sweater as it appears to be lighter than her face and then opened up a half-stop and full stop (for color slide film). Parts of the sweater seem a little overexposed. For B&W you can be more creative and previsualize it in many ways.
 
I hate reflective metering. That shot should be especially easy to meter with an incident dome. Her face does appear to me to be a half stop over exposed.

Might be faster to bracket than to meter... shooting chromes, it'd be safer.
 
Last edited:
In the the particular shot, one would under-expose the face if for some reason (catalog?) one absolutely had to save tone in the sweater...but metering the sweater's bright side would be risky, because fabrics don't reflect UV the way they're metered. My guess with that shot is that to save the tone in the sweater would mean losing the face entirely.

The lighting situation far-exceeds that film's tonal range. It'd be better to shoot with a low contrast color film, certainly not minilab-available film (which all seems high contrast), if one expected to do a lot of window-lit indoor shots.
 
With an M6, from your position, I would tilt the camera down slightly, pointing it at her knees perhaps, to get a meter reading, then recompose and shoot.
 
I would have done what you did... and probably would have gotten the same results.

There's another thing: with my Leica, which has a very good meter, I would have metered on the sweater and then open the lens maybe half a stop to get a bit more light on her face.

Another concern of mine would have been the composition, so I probably would have tried to shoot with a wide open lens (like you did) after focusing on her eyes and then recomposing by moving horizontally along the film plane.

In other words, by the book! 🙂

Ain't we smart! 😀
 
i would have probably used sunny-sixteen. It looks like a 1/iso shutter speed, f/8 aperture situation. No seriously, i would have done that, unless there was an incident meter - then i would have checked by placing it in a way that the sunlight falls on half of the dome directly. With a built-in meter, metering reflective on her face/head - i guess.
But i like the result you achieved; the face and hands are correctly exposed, and that's what is important - as djon said, the whole scene did not fit on the film anyway.
EDIT: what was your measurement result?🙂
 
There are a lot of ways to skin this cat. IMO, an incident would be the best option, but using a reflective meter, like Frank, I would try to find someting that approximated a neutral gray, or do as Gabriel suggests and allow the meter to average the scene and open up accordingly (usually around a stop). I use both methods with a metering camera.

Good idea for a thread.

🙂
 
Assuming the use of a spot meter...

1) Meter the brightest spot in the scene. Record it.
2) Meter the darkest spot in the sene. Record it.
3) Calculate the number of stops between the two. Record it.
4) Your film offers a particular latitude, and you should have some idea what it is.
5) Since you now have the total number of exposure stops the scene contains, count down from the top 1/2 of that number - or up from the bottom, your choice. If the film has enough latitude to contain the given range, then you're done. Set your exposure to this value and shoot it.
6) If your film does not contain enough exposure latitude to contain the brightest and darkest values in the scene, then you will lose something. With negative film, overexpose by the number of stops necessary to keep the detail in the darkest areas you wish to retain value in. With reversal (slide) film, the opposite.

This is because slide film is a positive - the brightest areas are the clearest parts of the film strip. Negative film is a negative (obviously) - the darkest areas are the clearest parts of the film. If there is emulsion present, there may be a way to retain some value, some image. If emulsion is gone (film is clear) then detail is gone and gone forever and cannot be recovered.

In the old days, people used EV (exposure values) to calculate exposure. An EV was easy to understand, because it was simple number like EV 10 or EV 14, etc. You do math on it quickly and easily to determine the above. EV 10 was always EV 10, whether you opened the aperture up or closed it down, so long as you adjusted the shutter speed the equivalent amount the OTHER way. Lenses on fixed-lens rangefinders were often EV-coupled for just this reason. You set the EV and then adjusted the speed or aperture as you wished - the other moved in harmony to keep the EV the same. I believe the old Weston Master light meters give readings in EV.

More often than not, though, I just meter what I think is the middle tone in the scene and shoot at that exposure setting. Of course, that often means blown highlights or blocked up shadows. I wish I took my own advice more often.

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks
 
In-ci-dent. Without approaching the subject, photographer turns left and points the dome of his trusty incident meter toward himself with roughly the same percentage of the dome illuminated as his subject (let's say 50% in this case). Meter. Take the picture.

Or Pherdinand's suggestion probably would work well.
 
backlit subjects

backlit subjects

What a great natural shot, can't tell at all that you interrupted her. If I was trying to be descreet and only had one shot, I would have (assuming you are shooting negative film) tilted the camera down and got the reading from the "shadow side" and likely would have lost more detail in the bright background. Now, if you felt you could stand unnoticed for a little longer, I think even from where you are standing you could have gotten two readings (bright and dark) and split the difference, leaning a bit to the dark side (over exposure).
 
Benjamin Marks said:
In-ci-dent. Without approaching the subject, photographer turns left and points the dome of his trusty incident meter toward himself with roughly the same percentage of the dome illuminated as his subject (let's say 50% in this case). Meter. Take the picture.

Or Pherdinand's suggestion probably would work well.
Click to expand...

I am unfamiliar with pointing the dome of an incident meter at oneself. Would this not be measuring reflected light through the incident dome? How does one ensure that 'the same percentage' of the dome as the subject is illuminated? This seems to me to be difficult, I'm having trouble visualizing it.

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks
 
danielnorton said:
can't tell at all that you interrupted her.
Click to expand...

Amazing isn't it, how fathers are quickly ignored by their daughters?
🙄
Nick
 
bmattock said:
Your film offers a particular latitude, and you should have some idea what it is.
Click to expand...

Firmly rooted in Zone system huh?

How do you formally measure the latitude of a new film negative or posititve?

Thanks

Nick
 
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