Hi,
I wrote the following earlier today to be a reply to Shel's post. Some
of it has been superceded by other people's replies, but I thought I'd
send it anyway.
The type of photography that I most enjoy looking at, and trying to
emulate, is exemplified by the Magnum agency. In many, perhaps most, of the
instances where I've seen the data, it seems that the photographers,
although they frequently use hi-tech cameras with tons of automation
options, tend to use incident meters to measure the light. This implies
that their exposure automation features are switched off. An example I saw
recently was a short video documentary of Don McCullin shooting his 'AIDS in
Africa' project last year, and there were examples in a recent edition of
one of the US photo mags when some Magnum photographers were discussing
their technique. Of course, there are also plenty of counterexamples. For
instance, Steve McCurry has said on many occasions that he relies
completely on his Nikon matrix metering; similarly, one of my friends
relies outside the studio on his Nikon matrix meters exclusively. However,
neither of them is a beginner.
I prefer to use incident light rather than reflected light, and now, having
started all-manual and been briefly seduced into AE by the LX, prefer not
to use AE in non-standard situations. The trick is to recognise the
non-standard situations. I do use the 'spot' meter in my cameras quite a lot
now that I have them - they're the first spotmeters I've used - but that is
for situations where I can't physically get the incident meter into the same
light that I want to measure. And I always try to spot-meter a mid-tone because
I'm not going to get into the Zone system - it's just not appropriate for what I
do.
It seems to me that spotmeters - that is, 1-degree meters, rather than the
ones built into cameras - are most useful when you want to sample the range
of measurements in a scene with a view to using that information later when
you're processing and printing. This lends itself mainly to quite static
subjects, but is not much use if you're covering a fairly dynamic
situation, which is why it's popular with Ansel Adamites but less so with
Bob Capa-bles.
>From the point of view of the beginning photographer it is surely simpler
and easier to use incident light measurements than it is to take multiple
spot measurements, write them down, choose one for setting the camera, and
use the remainder for the darkroom calculations. Like any learning process
it is more likely to be successful if it is built on incremental steps. It
seems to me that there is so much to learn in the zone system that it is
not worth it for the beginning 35mm photographer, who will be more
successful, more quickly, using incident readings as the basis of their
understanding of exposure.
For anybody who might be thinking of buying a spotmeter because they are
not happy with their in-camera readings I would recommend buying first an
incident meter and seeing how you get on with that. An incident meter is
nice and neutral, uninfluenced by reflectivity of tone and colour. If the
problem is about measuring *reflected* light then a spotmeter may not help
to solve the problem. An incident meter is also likely to be cheaper than a
spot meter, and some of them come with spotmeter attachments.
The zone system, after all, really has nothing to do with photography per
se. It is a workround designed to overcome the different technical
limitations of film and paper and their inability to handle the full
subject brightness range or even the same sub-range within it. It's about
trying to squeeze a quart into a pint pot. If these limitations did not
exist, I don't believe anybody would have invented the zone system. So for
a learner who's interested primarily in understanding light and metering I
would suggest that the zone system, and by implication spot-metering, is
likely to confuse rather than help because there are so many
inter-dependent variables. That was certainly my experience 25+ years ago.
It's certainly useful to understand the principles of the zone system in
this less-than-ideal world, but an ideal film and an ideal paper, both able
to handle the full brightness range that we ordinarily meet, would make the
zone system redundant (all other things being equal). Such a 'film' & paper
will become available as digital capture & inkjet printing technology
improve. The print will be the end product of the photographic process,
which is precisely the situation we have now in the fine-art photography
world. One instance where the end justifies the means.
---
Bob
mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Monday, June 04, 2001, 4:39:07 PM, you wrote:
> William Robb wrote:
>> I have seen hand held light meters with "spot" attchments. These
>> give about 5º angle of acceptance, hardly a spot meter at all.
>> Dont discount incident light readings. Metering the light
>> falling on the subject, rather than the light reflecting fron
>> the subject is far more accurate.
> Maybe ... but essentially I disagree with that statement. If the
> scene is an average scene, then an incident meter can be useful.
> However, add some deep shadows and some very bright highlights, and
> you're not going to get a reading that will allow for the best
> exposure, i.e., relying on what the incident meter tells you won't
> give you the opportunity to place shadow or highlight values.
> Further, there will be little opportunity to really learn about
> light and exposure. With a 1-degree spot meter you you can meter
> every part of the scene, and know exactly where the values will be
> and what you have to do to properly expose the film and what
> development will be needed.
>> Cheap light meters are not a good investment, IMO. The have a
>> tendency to not be accurate, not have good linearity and not be
>> colour blind (a fatal flaw in most light meters).
> I agree 100%.
>> As an aside, spot meters are not the easiest things to learn how
>> to use. It is not enough to just point the thing at a spot on
>> the subject and transfer the reading to the camera. You have to
>> be able to estimate accurately where on the tonal range of the
>> film the area you are metering will fall, you have to know if
>> your meter shows colour bias towards what you are measuring, and
>> if so, how much so that it can be accounted for.
> And that was my original point in suggesting that some knowledge
> beforehand (Adams' Zone System, for example) is an important
> consideration when using a spot meter. The spot meter makes more
> demands of the user, but, in time, the user will better understand
> light and exposure.
-
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