A Rose By Any Other Name II

I have the same beef with the careless use of the term overexpose which in my book means an exposure error to the detriment of the final print. I will often use more exposure to gain additional shadow detail but I try not to overexpose.

The various permutations of the Zone System have all sorts of terms for these two situations. THey are not used by everyone, but a lot of people understand Zone terminology.

what is the "correct" exposure...

I think some might view overexposure as a creative move. i.e 'I overexposed by 1 stop to boost the shadow detail'. Or "I overexposed by 1 stop to lighten the skintones'. And in that context it means to expose by more than the 'standard' zone V that their Weston meter tells them and therefore is too, a kind of overexposure.

This usage may or may not be technically correct but the trouble is that that kind of usage has been around for so long that it's going to be hard to change it. So common usage prevails but we can work around it by qualifying what we say – 'I really overexposed my film – much to the detriment of the tones in my classically inspired Ansel Adams print of a funny rock.' or 'I'm totally loving my deliberate 1 stop overexposure strategy of FP4 souped up in a dirty can of old Maxwell House instant powdered coffee'.

My understanding is that "over-" and "under-" expose always refers to the light meter indications. People would normally say: "in order to take a picture of a black cat with some coal as background, underexpose by 1.5 EV or so" and that would imply "compared to the exposure suggested by your light meter".

The meaning the OP is referring to, that is over- and underexposing beyond intention and scope, is normally described as "mistakenly overexposed", "grossly overexposed", or some words to that effect.

It's easier to stick to the abovementioned convention, rather than saying any time: "in order to take a picture of a black cat with some coal as background, take the reading of your lightmeter and increase exposure by 1.5 stops".

That's what I see in that word.

Fabrizio

PS I suppose life is easier for gardeners

Right on.

Life is too short for bad beer, and for worrying about technically incorrect terminology that everyone understands the meaning of anyway.