 Ray Charles |
LIGHT METERS If any one can give me advice on hand held meters, I have 2 canon camera's, the AV-1 & A-1. As you know they have there own light meters. my Q Is, would It be to my advantage to use a hand held meter, (ambient) or Is It reading the same light as the Internal light meter in the camera. Thank you.
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Jeff S. Kennedy |
A lot of it depends on what you are shooting and how good you are at taking reflective light readings. Ambient readings are a piece of cake. Just measure the light and go. Reflective readings (like the ones from in camera meters) take a little practice. You have to be aware of what tone you are metering. Is it a mid tone or do you have to compensate? You also have to take into consideration how and what you are shooting. If you are shooting a subject like a landscape and you can take your time to pull out your handheld meter then fine. If you are shooting moving subjects and need to meter on the fly then maybe the camera meter is the best solution. My handheld meter (Sekonic L508) is nice since it has a spot meter, incident meter, and a flash meter all in the same unit. Have I answered your question? Probably not. I think it's a question you have to answer for yourself.
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John A. Lind |
I believe the proper term for what you are calling "ambient" is "incident" light readings. These are helpful if working with scenes that are heavy with dark or light colors, and not balanced well between light and dark. In the little studio work I've done using monolights, the readings are *always" made incident using a flash meter. Some might disagree with this method in a studio all the time, but it has worked well for me. One can encounter problems with incident readings outdoors in very high contrast scenes with narrow latitude films which cannot capture both shadow and highlight details (transparency films in particular have narrow latitude). An incident reading will put you between the two, sometimes losing both and this may not be what you want (if it is, it's OK). On other occasions, an incident reading is not possible and one must use spot or some overall averaging method (matrix, center-weighted, etc.) with a reflected reading. A common situation is with landscapes in which it's impossible to get directly in front of the subject to aim back at the camera, or emulate its light direction and illumination level at the camera location. If absolute control of exposure is desired, along with placing it to obtain desired shadow or highlight detail, being able to visualize the desired final print and being able to do all of the above is important. In daylight outdoors, the weighted metering in my camera body usually works very well, but requires recognizing scenes in which it won't. One can read about techniques, but it requires practice and experience to "see" and recognize situations which call for a more sophisticated exposure method, and gain skill using them in combination with specific films (each of which has a different latitude to consider). -- John
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Ray Charles |
Hi Jeff, John. I thank you guys for helping me out. From the Imformation you have given me,to my understanding is, I realy don't need to use the hand held light meter, all I need to do Is meter through my camera, use a film with high latituide, stop up or down when the light Is not blanced.0h I like to shoot In available light, In doors and out. THANK ONCE AGAIN.
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John A. Lind |
Ray, Don't let "ease of exposure" entirely influence the films you choose to use. There's much more to consider than simply being able to take in all highlight and all shadow detail simultaneously under any conditions. Under some conditions (e.g. very low contrast), you may want a narrower latitude film. Under other conditions, no film can "get it all" and you still should make decisions about what detail you're willing to lose. I work with the very narrow latitude of Kodachrome and relatively narrow latitude of Scala most of the time (as compared to Portra or Tri-X). Film is a very personal choice and should be selected for what you want to final image to look like. Let what you envision for this drive film, lens (for perspective), lighting and composition choices. When I started doing this (creating a mental vision of the desired photograph before pressing the shutter release), decision-making about all the rest became much easier. You will find yourself wanting to exert control with film choice also as you gain experience with various films, subject material, and lighting conditions. I often use a relatively wide latitude film for urban cityscapes and "street shooting" at night. Not always though; it's based on what I've envisioned for the series of images and which film can be used to best achieve it. -- John
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Ray Charles |
Hi JOHN, thank's for your help, once more. I was reading about different types of film last week, I found the imformation very helpfull, from the imformation, I found out why I was not getting the kind of look I was hopeing for. since then I have purchast different types of brands,Ilford FP4 125, Ilford delta 400, Tmax 100, fuji neopan 100. I really like the look of the photos I shot, when I used the Ilford B/W 400 asa, Ive not tried the Ilford 125 0r the Tmax 100 yet. the Fuji I have used, I did like the rich colors.
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