Is my Canon A1 Light-Meter Faulty?

[judejenz]

Hey guys,
So I bought a Canon A1 the other day with a 50mm lense and shot my first few rolls of film at a party and in the city at night. What I find strange my light meter and the exposures that its giving me. So I shot at ISO400 at the party which was indoors with decent lighting, and it asked me to shoot at shutter speeds slower that 1/30! Not to mention it pushed my lense to its higher aperture (f/1.8). Even in my room at night, WITH a lightbulb fully illuminating the whole room, my Camera was still a asking for 1/20 shutter speeds. Anyway, so I'm a noob and didn't know my photos would expose like they did in photo 1. BUT... When I took it into the city and my uni, the light meter seemed to work spot on. It gave me perfect exposures even at night (as shown in picture 2) where the lighting was even worse than the party! Pretty sure my camera wanted me to use a shutter speed below 1/30 also for Photo 2, although, don't quote me on it. Maybe my light meter only works correctly in well lit areas and I got really lucky and held my camera super still for photo 2. But I'm still not sure. What do y'all think? Is it me or the light meter?

PHOTO 1

PHOTO 2

PHOTO 3 (AT Uni)

 

[gone]

Your last shot reminds me of pics of the old mother in law, but hers was taken from the other end.

The meter will give you correct readings for what it's pointed at, roughly the center 1/3 of the viewfinder. I assume that you set the camera's ISO correctly. Do you have a manual for it? The A-1 has multiple ways to set the exposure, so reading it is a good idea. Just google "Butkus Canon A1 manual" and he has them. $3 donation, and they're well worth it. He's a treasure on the internet for manuals.

Without another meter to compare it to, it's hard to know if your camera exposes correctly in low light. In any case, inside shots w/ a FD 50 1.8 and 400 film will often give you meter readings of 1/30, 1/15, or less. Ck the manual. You will learn quite a bit. Those are great cameras.

 

[judejenz]

hahahahaha damn, that is funny.
Thanks for your reply! Yeah I should have definitely checked out the manual. Thanks for the tip... Anyway, so from what you are telling me, my light meter seems to be working fine... Yep, definitely set the ISO correctly. If that's the case though, how come Photo 2 exposed well. I mean, that was also at night too. Are required shutter speeds at night higher outside than inside or did I just hold the camera more still? Also, for future parties, what ISO film do you think I should purchase in order to shoot handheld? Cheers!

 

[Peltigera]

In photo one, the people are moving giving you a lot of motion blur - in photo two, the street is not moving so there is no motion blur from the street. Those walking people in photo two are walking towards the camera or away from it rather than across the view so the motion blur from them is not apparent.