Using grey card

[V0IGTLANDER]

Hi

I just have acquired a Kodak gray card. The instruction says that we should not be taking the face value of the reading taken off a grey card but need to apply some adjustment to the reading :-

- subject of normal reflectance, increase the indicated exposure by 1/2 stop
- very light subject, decrease by 1/2 stop
- dark subject, increase by 1 to 1.5 stop

Is that correct because i thought we need not do any adjustment if reading is taken off the gray card. Thanks.

 

[RubenBlaedel]

I am not sure but i found that using my sekonic 508 flash meter for indecent metering on a flat surface would read fx. F 16 and then taken the same reading with reflecting light of the Kodak Gray card would read F 16,5
I tried the to use the AE flash meter on my Fuji GX 680 placcing the grey card under the lens and it would read 16,8 of the Grey card to.
The exposure ended up being right at 16 and not 16,5 so the grey card seem to need som adjusting.

 

[Roger Hicks]

Take a look at the free module about grey cards in Photo School at www.rogerandfrances.com. Grey cards really are far less useful than most people think.

Cheers,

Roger

 

[T_om]

Ah, yes... gray cards.

Go here for some interesting reading on gray cards. This has been an issue for many, many years. You would be better off getting a good incident meter than trying to meter from a gray card.

http://www.bythom.com/graycards.htm

Also note that Kodak themselves, buried somewhere deep, DEEP on their site, says in sorta a "Oh, by the way" kind of aside that their gray card "shouldn't be used for color correction" which also proves what most color shooters have know for years. Kodak gray cards color meter at about 10 units of green. You have to get a Gretag Macbeth or other "gray" card that is ALSO color corrected if you are doing critical color stuff.

Tom

 

[Doug]

Hmmm, T_om, I prefer Ruben's indecent metering method. 😀