okay lets say I'm E.T. and I want to expose right...

sthig

But I can only understand basic human language.

How would you tell an alien about the technique "expose to the right?"

----

Hopefully my analogy is not too corny but basically I've read and reread the expose right threads and I can't get it. I've been looking at my histogram when I take a picture and while I'm catching on a bit, I still don't quite understand everything.

So would one of you kind photogs be willing to explain in the most basic terms of what I'm supposed to do when I'm trying to get correct exposure for a shot.

Usually what I do is meter off a blade of grass or the blue sky however I'd love to know more about exposing to the right

best

cmason

I would have them read here

Seefutlung

sthig wrote:

Usually what I do is meter off a blade of grass or the blue sky

Sthig-
I think that before you get into histograms and keeping the graphs to the right you need to understand how a light meter works.

The meter see everything as 18% reflective gray. Which is alien speak. 18% gray is the color of a "gray card", google that term to see the darkness/lightness of that particular gray.

So lets say were are working in B&W (just to make things easier). The meter is designed to expose for 18% gray .... so that everything you use to meter on/from will be 18% gray. So if you meter off a black wall, process and print normally (no adjustments) that wall will be 18% gray in the print. If you meter off a white wall, process and print, that white wall will be the same 18% gray as the print of the black wall.

So this doesn't sound too good since most objects are not 18% gray. So if you meter on something that is lighter than 18% gray ... one has to overexpose in order to get the unadjusted final print to look lighter than 18% gray. Conversely, shooting something darker than 18% gray one has to underexpose in order to get the unadjusted final print darker than 18% gray.

Grass is darker than 18% gray and needs to be underexposed a stop and a half to two stops for proper metering. A blue sky is way lighter than 18% gray and probably needs around three to four stops of overexposure for a proper meter reading.

I don't know what equipment you have, but I suspect that your meter is taking an average of everything in the viewfinder ... which will work most of the time under "normal" conditions.

Essentially, what I'm saying is don't meter off the sky or the grass without compensating for what you have selected to meter. A white person's hand is usually one stop lighter than 18% gray. So meter off your hand (make sure that the hand is reflecting about the same as the image you're about to photograph), then open it up a stop if you're in manual or push the EV to +1 ... try this and see what happens to your images.

After you understand metering ... then mastering the histogram will be easy.

sthig

hey thanks guys.

I'd forgotten about metering off my hand.

I shoot with a 20d so no spot metering for me...however I do have a PNS camera with spot metering so sometimes I use it if needed.

But just to make sure I'm following you, I'd meter off my hand and then over expose +1, right (I almost always shoot in manual or arpeture if I'm doing wedding candids or something).

cmason - the link you sent is great and I've read and reread it but my brain just doesn't want to wrap around the concept (fwiw: I've got dyslexia so a lot of times my brain is lost on technical stuff. Of course the plus side of dyslexia is that I can create, rotate and flip images in my head so it's easy for me to compose images in my head).

Art Scott

personally I would prefer to carry an 18% grey card and not have to worry about over / underexposing.

They are cheap and can still be found easy enuff.

But I still carry a light meter every where I go and you can find a decent one for cheap....even cheaper for used ones.

Antonio Correia

It is a good question and it concerns most of the photographers.
I have been reading about it for some time but there is always someting to learn.
Seefutlung made it clear.
Thank you for the post.

Seefutlung

sthig wrote:

But just to make sure I'm following you, I'd meter off my hand and then over expose +1, right

Right.
Do a test. While standing in the same spot meter off the sky, take a shot. Meter off the grass ... take a shot, then meter off your hand, hit EV+1 ... take a shot an see which image looks best. Next meter off the grass adjust the EV to -1.5 and/or -2 and see if the exposure is the same as off the hand at +1. Just a way to double check. But a gray card, especially for wedding, which is somewhat of a controlled environment, is always good. Fill the frame with the card and center your meter. With a gray card your histogram should be straight line in the center.

De Nada y'all

sthig

Seefutlung wrote:

Right.
Do a test. While standing in the same spot meter off the sky, take a shot. Meter off the grass ... take a shot, then meter off your hand, hit EV+1 ... take a shot an see which image looks best. Next meter off the grass adjust the EV to 1.5+ and/or +2 and see if the exposure is the same as off the hand at +1. Just a way to double check. But a gray card, especially for wedding, which is somewhat of a controlled environment, is always good. Fill the frame with the card and center your meter. With a gray card your histogram should be straight line in the center.

De Nada y'all

thanks so much! your tips really helped me out on the wedding I shot this weekend!

best
scott

Seefutlung

sthig wrote:

thanks so much! your tips really helped me out on the wedding I shot this weekend!

best
scott

And I am glad to be able to have helped you out. Good luck and Good Shooting.

-Gary-

Antonio Correia

Seefutlung
Would you be so kind as to drop me a line about
http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=33229
Thank you. Where are your photos on the Web ?
Regards