My Blogging Reasons:

1) When I was just starting out in the photography world I didn't have a lot of people to help me, I didn't have money to take classes so a lot of it was done the wrong way first. I want this to be a place of resource for beginners/hobbyists and everyday people, a place where you can ask me anything
2) Once I found a network of other photographers there were so many willing to dish out their secrets for free and help me along the way and this is a way I figure I can give back to the community
3) I have learned so much that my head is starting to overflow and I need a place to keep my notes freeing up some of my brain space for other things
4) The best way for me to remember something is to teach it to someone else.

Disclaimer: I don't think nor claim to be the worlds greatest photographer, but I continue to study and work really hard and by golly one day I might just be the best, but for now I will continue to learn right along with you!

I will add onto the lessons, so if something doesn't make sense chances are you are skipping ahead go back and read through the archives. If it is doesn't click ASK me anything anytime!

You can email me any questions or just post it in the comments and I will address them all here.
mailto:amy@amynielson.com

Thursday, August 28, 2008

Exposing to "O"

A common misunderstanding is that your meter should always read "0" this is true ONLY if everything you take a picture of has a tone equal to GRAY and since that is hardly the case you have to learn to see tones and the ranges in order to meter correctly.


Here is a BLACK case that I metered at "0" to me this seems more GRAY than BLACK and the reason for that is because it is overexposed.


A proper metering for a BLACK case or anything BLACK and DARK toned would be almost "-2" I say almost because you want to leave a little room for editing.
Here is a WHITE paper metered at "0" again we see a GRAY color and the reason for this is because it is severely underexposed.
A proper metering for a WHITE paper and anything WHITE or LIGHT toned would be almost "+2" again I say almost for a little wiggle room in editing
Here we have a shot including all 3 tones. Here I metered my GRAY card to "0" and this is the rare case where metering exactly at "0" is correct.

Here is a GRAY card metered to "0" and this is what it is supposed to look like. Using a GRAY card for metering is VERY effective and makes the guess work easier, BUT I suggest learning to both use it and not use it since not every shot is one where you can freeze while you run inside to get the GRAY card

4 comments:

Sharon said...

So here's a question... Why when you have all three colors metered to "0" with a gray card is the white actually white and when you have just the white it is gray???? does that make sense?

Amy N. said...

Because I metered the gray card at "0" if I were to zoom in on my white paper (without changing my settings) my meter would actually read "+2" almost and if I were to zoom in on my black case my meter would read "-2" almost.

When I metered my white paper at "0" and got gray if I were to zoom in on my gray card (without changing settings) my meter would read very underexposed and no longer "O"

This is why it is imortant to zoom in on what you want metered (especially when you are using spot metering-we will go over the differences next I think). Because a normal scene has many different tones your meter will change with movement around it.

Sharon said...

Thanks, that makes sense...

Kaydee said...

I think this all makes sense, I am sure my ????'s will come as I think about a little bit more. Amy your great for sharing you talent with us. Thanks so much!!!