Topic: How do you measure light for chromes?

[original_ann]

Help me folks.  I have utterly gone mad and lost my mind.  I mean, seriously lost my mind as if someone shut the power off...  it is as if I had never shot chromes before. 

I am thinking okay... if anything, underexpose so as not to blow out the highlights and typically I am an incident light reader... but something told me no... I think I'm supposed to spot measure the lightest part of my subject where I want a bit of detail - - yes? no? which? neither? sometimes?

For those that care to read further, here is when the ding-dong stuff started:
Deep in the forest where a gaggle of magnolias catch my fancy every year around this time, I'm shooting yesterday and seeing the most luscious compositions in my viewfinder and feeling so exhilarated with every shot... got home and while taking the film out of the back I'm startled to find that the roll of Provia 100 I thought I'd just shot was actually a partial roll of T64.  Horrors.  I always carry 3 film backs and have NEVER made that mistake.  Grrr

So There I am, huffing and puffing, shoulder killing (still injured from shoveling out after Snowpocalypse 2010) lugging all my stuff toward the deep of the forest where I can see colors awaiting me.  Magnolias in pinks, reds, whites-blushes, violets and yellows.  I shoot and shoot... going by the reflective spot reading on a highlight I'd like detail and at one point, curiously take an incident reading and am stressed by how many stops of a spread it was...

If I took an incident reading, I was getting say  f/5.6 @ 1/30th, sometimes 1/60th if some dappled light reached the subject (and my meter).   But a spot reading (1 degree or 5 degree) gave me a consistent reading of 5.6 @ 1/250th  - - 2-3 stop spread. 

WHICH should I have used? I'm going to go back and reshoot some stuff tomorrow before they all blow all over the ground.   

Thank you for the assistance,
signed,
The Current Village Idiot

I was so upset that the only thing that could comfort me was telling myself I'd go back the next day (today) and shoot again. 

[Pete_R]

If you meter a highlight, you then need to adjust the reading to put that highlight on the part of the curve you want it to fall. If you meter a highlight and just use the exposure as-is, then it will put your highlights mid scale  and you'll lose shadow detail. Without detailed knowledge of the film characteristic though, how much you adjust the reading is guesswork. Giving a couple of extra stops would probably be in the right area and the incident reading you took sort of agrees.

I would stick with incident readings but, if you have dappled light and you think the highlights are most important, then make sure the meter is in the sunlight and not in the shadow.

Just my 2 cents worth.

[LT]

dont know if it's any help ... but when I used to shoot velvia, I'd meter the most important highlight then open up by 1.5 or 2 stops and let the shadows do whatever they wanted to do.  Seemed to work for me.   

[Phil Bebbington]

I have always just taken incident light readings and found the results perfectly good. It'sn been a while, but, like Peter and Leon say, if the highlights are imposratnt I would expose for them and let the shadows do their thing - I guess if the lighting is extreme there is always a pay off. I generally find the worries I have whilst taking the photo tend to be unfounded when I get the results.

[vicky slater]

Lots of good advice here......I can never remember what incident metering and the other one is....I think I have a complete thickness for anything technical.

[sapata]

Lots of good advice here......I can never remember what incident metering and the other one is....I think I have a complete thickness for anything technical.

Same as me... ! Even though I have  light meter I always do the very basics. I'll be following this thread and learn something for sure ! 

[This-is-damion]

I will also follow this thread as technical stuff like this totally goes over my head.

Would be great ifyou can post some examples of different exposures of the same scene.

[original_ann]

Vicky - sorry about the confusion!  I'm often that way as well, so I can appreciate laymen's speak! 

Incident readings measure the light falling on the subject (so with your meter in hand, go over to your subject and point it back toward your lens to measure)

Reflective readings measure the light reflecting off of your subject back at the camera's lens (in-camera meters measure this way, which is why you can look at your subject through the lens and measure without having to walk over to your subject;  or point your handheld meter at the subject and take the measurement)

Peter - you gave me an "A-ha" moment!  I didn't want to wash out/overexpose the highlights, which is why I went with the spot reading the highlights. 

But again: dingdong !!! (since I rarely reflective-meter)... I forgot that reflective readings produce middle grey (incident readings do not).   I don't want my highlights middle grey, I just was so focused on the "expose for the highlights" rule for slide film that I forgot about all else.  Frustrating!  I need to shoot slide film more often. 

With the very narrow exposure latitude of slide film, I think I'm going to take an incident reading and err on the side of underexposure by 1/2 stop (my lenses don't do 1/3 stops).   Maybe I have some more slide film at home and then I'll do some bracketed tests from which I can make notes.   

[Francois]

I think you figured it out before I had the time to finish... here is my take on it anyways...

Never forget that any meter will give the proper exposure for middle gray... or an 18% reflective card... or zone 5 for those Ansel aficionados.
So if it's a highlight you meter, it will be exposed on the film's sweet spot. Anything darker will be just that. But since there is nothing brighter than the highlight, you won't have anything brighter in the image. Since most slide film have only a 3 stop range, this means that the image is very likely to be underexposed if you used the spot reading.

Also keep in mind that all exposure meters strangely don't give the same reading in the same situation...

I would tend to spot meter the zone I want well exposed and let the rest fall where it should...
This is the type of situation where I would tend to bracket exposures. Since you're shooting slide, I would go towards underexposure since this will increase the color saturation on slide material. (on negative, underexposing makes muddy colors)

[original_ann]

Thanks Francois.  It was an unseasonably hot (in the 90s) windy day out there and I think I finally got a few shots that I can feel good about. 

[Francois]

Unbelievable how fast weather changed this spring. No more snow, birds are chirping like crazy looking for nests... very soothing after the crazy winter we had.

This morning was the very first thunder storm of the year... was fun to hear