Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1998/11/17
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]You are correct. Most of the time I've found that with scenics, simply tilting the lens down to exclude most of the sky is sufficient, certainly with negative film. If you can find enough of a single tonality (any tone) to fill the central 3/4 of the *camera's* viewfinder you can meter it and compensate the exposure to place it in it's proper tonality relative to middle. If this isn't possible, you can also get in close to anything of even tone (without refocussing the lens) in the same light as the subject, meter, and recompose. Last, you always have the option of metering with a longer lens, such as a 90 or 135, and then mount the wide-angle. None of these methods is lightning-quick, but if the light isn't changing quickly, once the exposure is set you can usually keep shooting. As you noted, a handheld spotmeter is also an option. I carry the Sekonic L408. It also offers incident and flash metering as well as a 5-deg. spotmeter, which I find 99% sufficient. It is more compact than the new 508, which has a 1-5deg. zoom spotmeter, but the incident housing is up top on a swivel like a studio meter. Regards, Nigel On Tue, 17 Nov 1998 18:29:08 -0000 "Dr James Harper" <DRJH@btinternet.com> writes: >I have a query. Several replies mentioned a metering problem, which I >understood, perhaps wrongly, to be the possibility of incorrect >exposure >because the meter's measuring angle covers a too large (or was it too >small?) area of the scene. If that is so, the solution is presumably >to be >even more careful about exactly what you select to meter on. But is >that >possible with a very wide angle lens? If the meter is being >presented >with a whole landscape, it must be difficult for it to decide what the >important parts are. Only a spot meter would cope, I imagine. In >what >conditions is the problem, if it exists, most likely to occur? > >Apologies for any unintentional technical naivete. All comments >gratefully received. > >JH > ___________________________________________________________________ You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com/getjuno.html or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866]