Hi, I have a few maybe subjective questions. I have had filters for some years.
1. Under daylight I can understand you meter the foreground and use that as it is. With a sunset when you meter the foreground do you underexpose it a bit so it look what it was like?
If you want to.
2. Some say after you meter the foreground and the background sky you note the difference in stops. If there is a 3 stop difference you use a 2 stop grad filter instead. Do you do that or do you use a 3 stop grad? I guess it makes the sky brighter by using a 2 stop filter .....so a bit more natural.
Cheers.
Again, if you want to.
At some point you get to make an aesthetic judgement call. It's really about what YOU want to see on your negative.
So, for instance, a normal sky and foreground and I'm getting 3 stops. Personally, I would NOT use a 3 stop filter, especially for black and white, as I want the sky to be brighter than the land. Especially if there are clouds, I want the brightest cloud to be controlled -- I want it to not blow out so I can see details -- but a white cloud and a blue sky that's not a stop brighter than the land is weird.
But... maybe you want weird. Like, I was experimenting over water and the sky was only a stop above the reflections of the ocean. I used a 1.5 medium and made the sky wacky weird:
But on this one, which is I think 8 seconds, the foreground was very dark and the sky was 3 stops over. I used a 2 stop reverse gnd because I wanted the sky to look like the sky looked, but just bring the foreground up enough that it wasn't black
For sunsets, it is also aesthetic. I like silhouettes, but sometimes I want a lit foreground so I'll stop the living crap out of the sunset. Maybe if I'm pointing into the sun I'll stop the horizon with a 2 stop rGND, then another stop with a second GND filter to bring the rest of the sky down another stop as a sort of bracketing technique. I will do one of each and decide which I like later. I'll still end up with a ground a stop under and a sky over on a really bright day, even with 3 stops.
And, sometimes, you have reflections that make it so you can't do a darned thing. Like a lagoon shot where the sky is only 1 stop more than the reflection on the water. I tend to either put one stop on the sky so they're roughly the same and shoot for the sky colors, knowing the foreground wiill go too dark:
Or I shoot for the foreground because I want to see it. In this case, there's a 1.5 stop rgnd on the sky and I metered the reeds for my exposure -- the red cast on the sky is because I used a crappy cheap GND that isn't particularly neutral:
I know it's not a pat answer, and I'm sorry. But I really don't know what the hell I'm doing, I just find playing with GNDs and landscape to be fun and interesting. So I'm suggesting you think about what YOU want to do and go play around some.
Basically, start by thinking in terms of keeping the dynamic range in the range of your film stock or digital sensor. Then play around, see what you like and don't like, and you'll get a feel for when a little is good or too much is too much.
