Exposure compensation

BetterSense · May 11, 2009

Just a reminder. You might want to check your exposure compensation setting. I had set my F801 to -2 stops exposure compensation for a spotlit stage performance several weeks ago. Of course I didn't notice that it was still set until I rewound the roll for processing. Luckily I did notice, because we are going on vacation in a week. Still lost about a half roll, I assume.

I'm kind of surprised the exposure compensation warning is as weak as it is. My pentax cameras flash LEDs in your face when it's on, on this thing there is just a tiny little flag on the main LCD.

nickandre · May 11, 2009

I hate that about my N80. Not so much exposure compensation because I'll usually check that, but I leave it in spot meter a lot and that does not agree with Kodachrome 64.

BetterSense · May 11, 2009

Why do you suppose it doesn't agree wit Kodachrome 64? I just loaded up my first roll of Kodachrome ever for vacation this weekend. I figured on leaving the camera on matrix, at the DX speed, and hoping for the best. It seems to expose Sensia and E100 just fine, is there anything funky about exposing Kodachrome?

Kevin Caulfield · May 11, 2009

BetterSense said:
Why do you suppose it doesn't agree wit Kodachrome 64? I just loaded up my first roll of Kodachrome ever for vacation this weekend. I figured on leaving the camera on matrix, at the DX speed, and hoping for the best. It seems to expose Sensia and E100 just fine, is there anything funky about exposing Kodachrome?

Presumably because the chances of the spot meter being randomly pointed at exactly the right spot would usually be pretty low?

BetterSense · May 11, 2009

Oh. I suppose.

kodachrome64 · May 11, 2009

BetterSense said:
Why do you suppose it doesn't agree wit Kodachrome 64? I just loaded up my first roll of Kodachrome ever for vacation this weekend. I figured on leaving the camera on matrix, at the DX speed, and hoping for the best. It seems to expose Sensia and E100 just fine, is there anything funky about exposing Kodachrome?

Enjoy your first roll of KR64! If you can expose other slide films fine, you shouldn't have any problem with Kodachrome. Just set it at 64 and use matrix metering, at least your first time. Some people have a different EI that suits their shooting style (like 80) but I wouldn't recommend doing that unless you decide you need to based on experience. I don't find KR64 any harder (or easier) to expose properly than E6 films.

Rol_Lei Nut · May 12, 2009

Kevin Caulfield said:
Presumably because the chances of the spot meter being randomly pointed at exactly the right spot would usually be pretty low?

The whole point of a spot meter does have something to do with pointing it at exactly the right spot....

Kevin Caulfield · May 12, 2009

Rol_Lei Nut said:
The whole point of a spot meter does have something to do with pointing it at exactly the right spot....

That was my point exactly, if you'll pardon my pun.

Lee L · May 12, 2009

Forgetting that you have autoexposure compensation dialed in is a very good reason for using manual exposure settings when you need to go off the camera's chosen autoexposure. That's what I've done with autoexposure cameras for the last 3 decades. (But I very rarely shoot autoexposure in the first place.)

Lee

nickandre · May 12, 2009

Yes. The spot meter goes where the spot meter goes, and my 18% grey may not be in the middle of the image. It's very narrow in the exposure latitude department; it requires careful contemplation. OTOH my AE-1 in shutter priority worked fine...

Rol_Lei Nut · May 12, 2009

tiberiustibz said:
Yes. The spot meter goes where the spot meter goes, and my 18% grey may not be in the middle of the image.

There's a new-fangled gadget built into most modern cameras called AE-lock...

Couldn't imagine using auto exposure without it!
;-)

Q.G. · May 12, 2009

I couldn't imagine using auto exposure without using the "off", or ",manual" gadget.
Makes live much easier. And produces better results.

Rol_Lei Nut · May 12, 2009

Q.G. said:
I couldn't imagine using auto exposure without using the "off", or ",manual" gadget.
Makes live much easier. And produces better results.

I find myself in the rather surprising, odd & awkward position of actually defending auto exposure....

How is using AE with AE-lock different from manual (at least in the most cases)?
(Not counting external hand-held meters, very long exposures, odd filter use and so on)

BetterSense · May 12, 2009

The compounding factor that led to the blunder, is that this camera has an "off" switch. In my mind, when I turned the camera off and put it on the shelf, when I picked it up weeks later and turned it on, there would be no reason to assume the exposure compensation was still on from before.

I don't see how the autoexposure matters. If it had been a manual camera, I would still have set exposure compensation, or I wouldn't be able to use most in-camera meters satisfactorily.

Rol_Lei Nut · May 12, 2009

BetterSense said:
The compounding factor that led to the blunder, is that this camera has an "off" switch. In my mind, when I turned the camera off and put it on the shelf, when I picked it up weeks later and turned it on, there would be no reason to assume the exposure compensation was still on from before.

I don't see how the autoexposure matters. If it had been a manual camera, I would still have set exposure compensation, or I wouldn't be able to use most in-camera meters satisfactorily.

I suppose my own take is that, when manual metering is easily accessible and auto- has a practical AE-lock, there is little reason to use exposure compensation.

While it may be useful to *trick* the camera beyond it's accepted ISO range or in other special situations, I've always avoided using it exactly for the reason cited by the OP: Too great a risk of forgetting that it is set.

Q.G. · May 12, 2009

Indeed.

There are two ways to compensate.

One is to take a reading, and then adjust the aperture and/or shutterspeed according to what you want.

The other is to tell the camera to correct what it does to either aperture or shutterspeed (or both).

No need for a correction dial, switch or button when you do not let the camera set aperture and/or shutterspeed.
So no opportunity to forget about any correction you might have set when you're not using auto-modes.

So, Bettersense, autoexposure does matter.

And, Rollei Nut, that's the difference between manual and AE, even with AE lock.

By the way, if light levels are beyond the range of what a meter can meter, setting another ISO will not be of help. It can neither change light levels nor adjust the sensitivity of the meter.
But yes, you can point the meter to a brighter bit in the scene, and guess how much that needs to be corrected to get the important bit you could not meter properly exposed. So i guess it is a useful "trick".

eddym · May 12, 2009

Rol_Lei Nut said:
I find myself in the rather surprising, odd & awkward position of actually defending auto exposure....

How is using AE with AE-lock different from manual (at least in the most cases)?
(Not counting external hand-held meters, very long exposures, odd filter use and so on)

Looking at your list of equipment reminds me of the good old days when I had a couple of SL35E's. One of my favorite features of the camera was that the AE lock was built in to the shutter release button. It was the first camera I had owned that was so easy to use in auto exposure. I was in the habit when using manual metering cameras of finding a "medium gray reflectance" area in the scene, and taking my reading from that. With the SL35E, it was so simple to do that: just aim at the area to be metered, press the shutter release gently, recompose, and shoot. A wonderful, and very ergonomic, camera with great Zeiss lenses!

eddym · May 12, 2009

BetterSense said:
I don't see how the autoexposure matters. If it had been a manual camera, I would still have set exposure compensation, or I wouldn't be able to use most in-camera meters satisfactorily.

Don't understand why not. Maybe it's just that we have different ways of shooting, but I have never used the exposure compensation switches of either auto or manual cameras. With manual metering, you just meter the area you want to read from, then open or close the aperture as much as you want to. You compensate with your fingers, by adjusting the aperture or shutter speed.

Rol_Lei Nut · May 12, 2009

eddym said:
Looking at your list of equipment reminds me of the good old days when I had a couple of SL35E's. One of my favorite features of the camera was that the AE lock was built in to the shutter release button... A wonderful, and very ergonomic, camera with great Zeiss lenses!

Yikes! I though I was alone on the planet to appreciate the SL35-E (Despite sits various shortcomings)!

Nice to hear from another Rollei veteran...
_____________
Q.C.: I still don't get your point (is there one?)

BetterSense · May 12, 2009

Don't understand why not. Maybe it's just that we have different ways of shooting, but I have never used the exposure compensation switches of either auto or manual cameras. With manual metering, you just meter the area you want to read from, then open or close the aperture as much as you want to. You compensate with your fingers, by adjusting the aperture or shutter speed.

On my Pentax cameras, the manual meter tells you you are over or under, but not by how much. A pretty bad meter. On my Olympus camera, the manual meter will not go to + or - 2 stops. Only one stop in either direction is visible. So if you know you need -2 stops because of a spotlit performer, you have to meter each shot, then adjust 2 stops in the right direction. So why not just dial in the 2 stops to start with? If I didn't have exposure compensation, I would adjust the film speed up, so that I could meter normally without going through gyrations in order to meter, then correct every shot. So even with a manual exposure method, I would be using exposure compensation.

Now, the Nikon in question does have an electronical sliding meter thing. You could easily just meter everything at -2 with this particular camera, it's true.

eddym · May 12, 2009

BetterSense said:
On my Pentax cameras, the manual meter tells you you are over or under, but not by how much. A pretty bad meter. On my Olympus camera, the manual meter will not go to + or - 2 stops. Only one stop in either direction is visible. So if you know you need -2 stops because of a spotlit performer, you have to meter each shot, then adjust 2 stops in the right direction. So why not just dial in the 2 stops to start with? If I didn't have exposure compensation, I would adjust the film speed up, so that I could meter normally without going through gyrations in order to meter, then correct every shot. So even with a manual exposure method, I would be using exposure compensation.

Now, the Nikon in question does have an electronical sliding meter thing. You could easily just meter everything at -2 with this particular camera, it's true.

Doesn't the lens aperture ring (and shutter speed knob) have click stops? I just count clicks.

Again, we each have our favorite ways of working, but I find having to figure out which way to turn an exposure comp dial too much to think about whilst shooting. Turning an aperture ring, on the other hand, is second nature, especially when I just take the reading off the area that I want to be gray, and shoot.

But I guess that's why the camera manufacturers make cameras that work for both of us!

Rol_Lei Nut · May 12, 2009

BetterSense said:
So if you know you need -2 stops because of a spotlit performer, you have to meter each shot, then adjust 2 stops in the right direction. So why not just dial in the 2 stops to start with? If I didn't have exposure compensation, I would adjust the film speed up, so that I could meter normally without going through gyrations in order to meter, then correct every shot. So even with a manual exposure method, I would be using exposure compensation.

How do you know you need -2 stops compensation? Is that with every lens (i.e. metering coverage)?

I've never used exposure compensation.
For theatrical/concert shots, I've incident metered the stage lights beforehand (when possible), spot metered them (also when possible), or compensated the exposure manually (counting diaphragm clicks or speed clicks).

Q.G. · May 12, 2009

Rol_Lei Nut said:
Q.C.: I still don't get your point (is there one?)

Absolutely.
The moment you happen to find a camera with an Auto-mode in your hands, switch the auto-thingy off.
This woudn't have happened if the OP had done that.

Rol_Lei Nut · May 12, 2009

Q.G. said:
Absolutely.
The moment you happen to find a camera with an Auto-mode in your hands, switch the auto-thingy off.
This woudn't have happened if the OP had done that.

Yes, but if you know what you're doing, auto + AE lock is the same as manual (usual caveats apply)....

Q.G. · May 12, 2009

Rol_Lei Nut said:
How do you know you need -2 stops compensation? Is that with every lens (i.e. metering coverage)?

I've never used exposure compensation.
For theatrical/concert shots, I've incident metered the stage lights beforehand (when possible), spot metered them (also when possible), or compensated the exposure manually (counting diaphragm clicks or speed clicks).

But how did you know how much you needed to compensate .. ?

Rings a bell?

Now how, if you "compensated the exposure manually", can you "never [have] used exposure compensation"?

But i know what you mean: you've never told the camera to change what it does. (That is, you have, but only by using the AE lock, and perhaps not by using a compensation dial).
That's the thing i tried to explain earlier. There is an easy way that does not lead to problems, and another way that does.
Do the first ('compensate' when setting aperture or shutterspeed manually), and not use the button/switch/knob/dial (i.e. not need to because you must correct what you let the camera do), and it would never have happened.

Exposure compensation

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