My first camera with metering had a spot meter only, and I soon learned the zone system of metering, relying primarily on using skin tone as the spot for metering. It usually left me with enough latitude that I could dodge and burn in the darkroom and have a usable print.
Before that, I used incident light metering with a selenium meter. It also gave me film with enough latitude to salvage detail in overexposed areas. Jeffery On Nov 21, 2010, at 8:52 PM, paul stenquist wrote: > Yes, a spot meter is a good tool, but it's only valuable if you can relate > the spot you're metering to 18% gray and then compensate accordingly. With > the K7 and K5, matrix metering is accurate enough that spot metering is > rarely needed. However, I do sometimes use it when shooting something like a > neutral colored bird against a white sky background. > Paul > > > On Nov 21, 2010, at 9:41 PM, Nick David Wright wrote: > >> Jeffery, you're missing the point of the spot meter. IMHO spot meter >> was never intended to be used in auto mode (at least not without >> exposure lock and exposure compensation). >> >> The spot meter is there specifically so you can /know/ your highlights >> will not be blown. See this blog post: >> http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2009/05/do-not-fear-the-sun.html >> >> ~nick >> >> On Sun, Nov 21, 2010 at 8:10 PM, Jeffery Smith <[email protected]> >> wrote: >>> I was never one to bracket when shooting film, and most of my wasted images >>> were due to dull subject matter and poor choice of subject/angle/telephone >>> pole projecting from the subject's head, not exposure. My biggest hurdle >>> with digital is what seems to be a lack of exposure latitude that I can >>> only attribute to the automation of the camera making some bad choices. >>> That said, spray and pray is becoming more of a norm for me. After all, >>> when my high capacity memory card keeps telling me that I have 999 >>> exposures left, then what the hell. But I wish that this were not the case. >>> If the digital camera would give me a sweet spot ISO from which I had some >>> confidence that exposure over the entire frame could be salvaged no matter >>> what the camera chose for me, I could spend a lot more time composing and >>> moving around, thinking more about the subject. >>> >>> For now, I have decided never to use spot metering on a dSLR. The area >>> being spot measured looks great, but that doesn't mean I can salvage the >>> blown highlights. >>> >>> Jeffery >>> >>> >>> On Nov 21, 2010, at 7:33 PM, Walter Gilbert wrote: >>> >>>> Hi all, >>>> >>>> For the past couple of days, I seem to keep encountering references to >>>> "stochastic" photography -- or "spray and pray" if you will, and it's >>>> piqued my interest. It's not that I'm considering actively pursuing the >>>> practice so much as I wonder how much my current style (method?) could >>>> actually be considered stochastic. Having never worked in the vicinity of >>>> another photographer before, my days out shooting with Ted Beilby were, as >>>> I said, educational. We took nearly diametrically opposed approaches. >>>> >>>> Clearly, Ted came out with better quality shots than I did. He was much >>>> more methodical and exacting and produce much more highly textured images >>>> than I did. At the same time, I came out with some images that, while not >>>> as polished as Ted's, did have some redeeming value -- at least I thought >>>> they did. I was so arrested by the sheer amount of potential subject >>>> matter that I felt I had to get as many different shots as I could in >>>> order to get a reasonable account of my experience, so I shot hand-held, >>>> almost exclusively. Knowing that I'd have at least several hundred shots >>>> to go through at the end of my trip (also, due to a relative lack of PC >>>> processing power and memory), I stuck to shooting single exposures in jpeg. >>>> >>>> Some subjects, I chose to take three or four different shots from >>>> different perspectives and focal depths, while others I shot once or twice >>>> and moved on. And, that's typically the way I do things. A large part of >>>> the reason for that is that I simply don't trust what the camera shows me >>>> on its display to be an accurate depiction of what I'm going to see when I >>>> load it onto the computer. The same goes for my perception of any given >>>> scene at the time. I come away with rough approximation in my mind, and >>>> when I get home, I'm usually "fairly"close, but never seemingly dead-on in >>>> my expectations. >>>> >>>> And, of course, a good bit of what I do shoot simply defies staging in any >>>> practical sense. I'm not going to be able to tell a butterfly how to hold >>>> its wings, or a bird where to position itself within my frame. So, I have >>>> to make snap judgments and several attempts. To the extent that I'm able >>>> to dictate composition, I do make a fairly diligent attempt at it. But, >>>> at the same time, I don't try to control every minute detail -- >>>> essentially because the vast majority of the subjects I shoot are in an >>>> environment that simply defies control. >>>> >>>> So, I was just curious as to the thoughts of the folks on the list as to >>>> how much my approach would be considered "spray and pray" by more seasoned >>>> photographers, and how much it would benefit if it were less so. >>>> >>>> Thanks for any input anyone has to offer. >>>> >>>> -- Walt >>>> >>>> http://www.pentaxphotogallery.com/waltergilbert >>>> http://waltgilbert.posterous.com/ <http://polipix.posterous.com/> >>>> Contact Me Facebook <http://www.facebook.com/walt.gilbert>Flickr >>>> <http://www.flickr.com/photos/walt_gilbert/>Twitter >>>> <http://twitter.com/walt_gilbert> >>>> >>>> --- @ WiseStamp Signature >>>> <http://my.wisestamp.com/link?u=ypgdb385pypw7fhb&site=www.wisestamp.com/email-install>. >>>> Get it now >>>> <http://my.wisestamp.com/link?u=ypgdb385pypw7fhb&site=www.wisestamp.com/email-install> >>>> >>>> >>>> -- >>>> PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List >>>> [email protected] >>>> http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net >>>> to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and >>>> follow the directions. >>> >>> >>> -- >>> PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List >>> [email protected] >>> http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net >>> to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and >>> follow the directions. >>> >> >> >> >> -- >> ~Nick David Wright >> http://www.nickdavidwright.net/ >> >> -- >> PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List >> [email protected] >> http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net >> to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and >> follow the directions. > > > -- > PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List > [email protected] > http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net > to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow > the directions. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
