I admit it. I'm a hack. Exposure meter? What's that. Oh, you mean
the flash meter. OK.
Chuck Norcutt
On 9/28/2012 9:58 AM, Ken Norton wrote:
>> It has been my understanding that Dr. ISO is indeed a member of the
>> Moose collective along with Dr. Noflash.
>
> Doctor, Doctor, Give me the news...
>
>> I think AG is spot on with slide film though as there is a
>> clear mid-tone standard.
>> John Shaw even recommended calibrating his ext meter using the slides
>> themselves.
>
> My own photographic history indicates that I'm mostly a mid-tone kinda guy.
> When growing up, I mostly shot B&W, but that was mostly school yearbook
> kinda stuff. And my cameras were Yashica Electro-35 GSN's that had the
> forward-facing meter sensor tied to the dedicated aperture-priority
> exposure system. Once I got the OM-2S, I converted over mostly to slide
> films. It wasn't until buying John Shaw's books did I really learn the
> proper way of exposing slides.
>
> The key to using transparency (reversal) film is that the exposure is
> final. The captured shot is the final shot. There is no raw conversion or
> post-processing to fine-tune and adjust the exposure. Exceptions exist, of
> course, when you are making prints and can do some fancy masking and such
> to take care of some stuff, but since I mostly shot for stock, the images
> had to be publication-ready right in the camera. It's a discipline which
> has paid off handsomely for me in the digital age as I've been able to
> successfully shoot many, many major things with just in-camera JPEG without
> fear. Being able to shoot and burn/upload without opening up anything in
> "Photoshop" is liberating. All I have to do is whip through the images and
> separate the chaff.
>
> My methodology when shooting B&W film is a little bit bipolar. On the one
> hand, I meter more for the mid-tones than not. But when the lighting is
> tricky, or when the subject is very bright or dark, I'll go to multi-spot
> metering and dive deep into the bowels of the Zone System.
>
>
>> I also now wonder how usefaul a new fancy Sekonic meter actually is for
>> digital. Reading the last "rawdigger" site and others it seems it might
>> have to be callibrated as to what is best for the
>> particular cam and indeed may not apply to all lighting conditions with
>> different color temp.
>
> The latest/greatest Sekonics are actually remarkably useful for digital.
> The L-768 is an incredible meter that allows you do fully calibrate it to
> your cameras or films. If you are an ETTR kinda guy, this meter is cat's
> meow. Extremely handy. I spent quite some time reverse-engineering what it
> is doing and am applying some of those techniques to the L-508. The
> Sekonics cannot differentiate between color channels, but at least you can
> determine the exact clip point of the exposure. Once calibration is
> completed, just spot meter the highlight in the scene and a press of a
> button will indicate the exposure needed by the camera or film to protect
> that highlight. It stores multiple calibrations, so if you switch cameras
> or films, it will give you the exposure needed for the other camera or film.
>
> I'm convinced that most photographers shy away from handheld meters mostly
> because it's another thing to learn and perfect. It has nothing to do with
> superior working methods or whatever (I can chimp, chimp is my friend). If
> a person REALLY cares about exact exposure determination, especially in a
> flash or mixed lighting environment they would almost certainly be using a
> spot/ambient/flash meter. But the attitude of knowing that you can fix
> things in raw conversion or in post-processing promotes most photographers
> to the category of "hack" when in the field.
>
> :)
>
> Did I get everybody's attention?
>
> Seriously, there is a time/place for everything. I can "hack" with the best
> of them and usually do. Joel will attest to the fact that the Sekonic saw
> little use last week, but it was used for several shots where I couldn't
> get a proper metering using the in-camera meter. I also used it for some
> sanity checks when the lighting was odd.
>
> AG (hacks are us) Schnozz
>
>
--
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