Those with meterless rangefinders: how do you set your exposure?

Those with meterless rangefinders: how do you set your exposure?

  • I spot meter everything. Usually twice.

    Votes: 34 3.7%

  • I use a handheld incident meter with every shot.

    Votes: 135 14.7%

  • I only meter when I think the light has changed.

    Votes: 390 42.4%

  • I use the sunny 16 rule almost exclusively.

    Votes: 211 22.9%

  • I use an EV chart.

    Votes: 43 4.7%

  • I have been shooting long enough that it is intuitive for me.

    Votes: 107 11.6%
  • Total voters
    920
I like my Sekonic Twinmate handheld reflective meter. I try to use it with the zone system, although a spot meter would be more accurate. The Twinmate is handy because you can also switch to incident light (where the situation permits) to check how accurate your zone compensation is. I also just take a few ballpark readings (sun, shade, sky, ground, etc.) and only meter when the light has changed significantly. Of course, this method is less successful with colour film but then reflective meters are not that much better than guesstimates anyway...

Anyone know of a good, handy handheld meter with a spot attachment? That would offer the ideal amount of flexibility and accuracy for most situations, I should think.
 
kuzano said:
...I find this little selenium cell Sekonic (no model name) quite handy. It has a shoe clip on the bottom, but I usually use the neck strap and drop it in my shirt pocket. As you can see it's quite small...
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That's nice, I have one of those too and I had never seen another one until now.

What camera do you use it with?
 
Rayt said:
When I was a kid and didn't know what a light meter was I set the aperture and shutter speed according to the little figures printed inside the box of film i.e., man standing under a tree = 1/60, f/8, and the photos always came out right.
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I had my fathers GE light meter, but it wasn't easy for me to figure out. In Vietnam, I had no light meter for a long time. You are right. I also used the data sheet that came with the film. If my light didn't match I exposed from experience and bracketed. Those data sheets worked very well.
 
I think what it comes down to for me is distraction. Accessory anything bothers me. I'm just as happy shooting AE and autofocus with a DSLR as I am Sunny-16ing with the M2. (Well...the M2 is special. But with an unmetered camera in general.)

I would rather lose a few exposures on a roll by guessing wrong, than burdening myself with metering for my whole day of shooting.
 
I tried "sunny 16" and various exposure charts some time ago, but found that I never got on with them and in the end went back to my original method of using a Weston Master V in incident mode. These days I've updated a bit and use a Sekonic L308 flashmate.
 
photorat said:
Anyone know of a good, handy handheld meter with a spot attachment? That would offer the ideal amount of flexibility and accuracy for most situations, I should think.
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There is a spot attachment for most of the classic Gossen meters, that is quite nice to use. For example, ebay item # 390016278904.

What really helps me using the Zone system are contrast scales that you find on some digital meters.

Best,

Roland.
 
Tomorrow I go meterless ... I have a day to spend in the city waiting for a vehicle to be serviced and I'm going to spend it with my M2, 35mm Hexanon, a couple of rolls of film and NO meter! I haven't done it in a long time and this thread has inspired me to do so! 🙂
 
Some mixture of Keith's exposure chart with a lot more guessing based on sunny 16. I have an old Weston selenium meter that I've decided lately to not trust as much as I used to.

Sometimes though, I get tired of thinking and have to pick up my Yashica GSN, but overall I enjoy going unencumbered by batteries more.
 
Cameras I use the little Sekonic with:

Cameras I use the little Sekonic with:

CLE-RF said:
That's nice, I have one of those too and I had never seen another one until now.

What camera do you use it with?
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I have a couple of old folders... a perkeo and a Balda Baldax. But, more recently, I have been using it with a Kiev (Kneb) and J8
 
Minolta meters often have spot attachments

Minolta meters often have spot attachments

photorat said:
Anyone know of a good, handy handheld meter with a spot attachment? That would offer the ideal amount of flexibility and accuracy for most situations, I should think.
Click to expand...

The Gossen attachment mentioned before has two settings... 7 degree and 15 degree. This attachment fits many of the Gossen, like luna pro, luna pro F, and others of that style.

I have a minolta autometerII and Autometer IVF digital. There is a 5 degree spot attachment that fits both of them, as well as other models. See this item number on ebay.

eBay item number
282385489
 
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I have a 20 or so year old minolta meter, still works like a champ. It does have a spot meter attatchment, but it throws off the exposure by something like half a stop, so you have to do a bit of mental math.
 
I like a good spot meter with or on any camera I shoot with. If I'm pretty sure my light isn't going to change much, I'll just meter a grey card in that direct light and that will give me a good setting to go with. If I'm being a little more deliberate, I'll use a simplified zone system and usually put my shadows in zone 3 and let the highlights fall where they may. I don't worry about adjusting dev. time - I find as long as my shadows are good the rest of the negative is very printable.

In a pinch on a sunny day, rather than sunny 16 I'll spot meter some green grass - in sun green grass reads about the same as a grey card.
 
Useful

Useful

From the mid seventies until the mid eighties I used TTL cameras. Then I put the cameras away until earlier this year when I bought an M3. At first I thought that I had made a mistake and would have problems with exposure. Maybe I had over reacted when using a fully auto digital point and shoot (which was what aroused my interest again).
However bought a Sekonic 208 and read up on sunny 16 and find that it is not so bad even though I shoot slide.
I now only meter when the light changes and am much more confident.
This thread has been very useful.
 
Educated Guesswork...in most cases

I normally have more than one camera with me when I go out and at least one will have a meter...I just tranfer the info to the meterless one...
 
EV tables for me. Like Mr Fibble and Keith I started a few years ago at Fred Parker's Ultimate Exposure Calculator. Like Keith I made up a card with tables, one for 35RC range and one for OM40 range. Had good results so far, but I constantly 'tweak' the tables according to the results. 🙄
 
I start out with an initial spotmetering of something neutral, such as the inside of my left hand, then open up one stop. Then I use the Sunny X Rule, where X changes depending on the intensity of the sun/light. I often scan a scene visually, followed by a few readings off the shade and hotspots to find a comfortable balance for the shot. Exposures for negative film differ slightly from transparency film as negative film likes a one stop overexposure but transparency film prefers a half stop underexposure. The rest is simply metering by the brain [experience].
 
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