Landscapes - spot metering and using grad filters.

Hi, I have juts got my medium format, so before the 35mm equip are very automated and I haven't written down detailed notes.

1. When photographing landscapes. When you spot meter the foreground do you go with what the meter says or do you underexpose it by a stop?

2. When you have your foreground meter reading and the sky's meter reading do you just select the grad filter based on that or do you reduce the grad filter by 1 stop so the sky is a bit brighter? I have heard that people do this as it looks more natural.

3. I have only got the 2 stop soft and 3 stop hard. For the time being how do you suggest me work with this should the meter readings require something different?



Thanks.

there're couple of ways to meter. simple one is meter what you want to render as mid tone and use the reading. another is to meter what you want to render as shadows if you're using negative film or hightlights if you're using positive, then adjust for mid tone by underexpose 2~3 stops or overexpose 2~3 stops

if your grads are ND then I would take a reading of anything without the grad and then meter the same point through the grad at top to find the difference. i.e. how much the grad reduces the exposure at the top and then meter the same point through grad and bottom end of grad area.
Then you know how many stops the top of the grad adjusts exposure and how many stops difference the bottom makes.

Where you actually place the grad over the lens obviously makes a difference. So you should meter subject without the grad and then make a mental calculation of how much difference the grad is going to make depending on where you place it over the lens.
Whether you meter the foreground(lower) which has zero grad effect or the sky(upper) area is upto you. It is the mental calculation of how much grad effect will be applied which is important and will be based on which portion of the grad is over that part of the image so you know how much effect it will have. Simplest would be to meter the lower area unaffected by the grad and expose for that but you still need to meter the upper area too otherwise you will have no idea how much grad effect you will get on it according to where you have placed the grad over the lens. i.e. you need to engage brain when using grads to get the effect you want. A bit of practice and hence experience with this will soon give a better idea of how your grads will affect the resulting image.

Keep the sky out of all reflectance readings any you will be fine. I mostly use an averaging meter, but I meter with the sky out of the view of the light meter.

My own technique is that I do not, and never will, meter the sky (especially in the New Zealand alpine areas!), because it is the landscape that I an concentrating on for the exposure I want. The sky can be taken care of later (in printing). I further suggest not relying on graduated filters, but work up a skill set with the spot meter to bring everything under control without any supplementary filtration.

I recommend learning to use the meter proficiently by itself before complicating the process with grad filter usage. I have been taking color shots
in the mountains for half a century now, and have never once found it necessary to use a grad filter, as if they even existed back then! I realize that
they are popular now; but I have yet to see a picture taken with one that didn't look patently fake, especially those shots taken by a particular person whose name is now associated with a brand of them! People are just in too much of a hurry to bag some stereotypical scenic subject that they never
take the time to study, absorb, and appreciate the quality of the light; or to learn what film itself can or can't do. Burn all your postcards and just
watch an entire sunset in the mountains without even touching a camera. I've done that even with an 8x10 sitting right there on the tripod all ready
to shoot. If the light doesn't get into your being, it sure as heck won't appear authentic in your shots. Those of us who have "lived" the light our whole
lives can sure spot the difference.

^^ +1 to learning metering proficiency.

DREW WILEY said:

I have been taking color shots in the mountains for half a century now, and have never once found it necessary to use a grad filter, as if they even existed back then!

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At higher altitudes the sky is a much deeper blue than at lower altitudes. And the air is colder at altitude and contains much less water vapour if any. The air is very dry at 12000ft. So I figure there would be much less need to use a grad compared to lower altitudes such as coastal shots over the beach and sea.

I have a B&W shot of the Matterhorn in which I used a light yellow filter. The sky was a deep blue but renders almost black in the print at normal contrast. At sea level I'd need a red filter to get as much filter effect.

So I think its really a question of reading the subject and assessing whether a grad would help or hinder and how much would be required to help if any.

I thought grads were a color photo thing. Makes no sense where black and white contrast filters do their own thing, increasing contrast instead of
diminishing it overall. Skies aren't as blue as they once were. The effect of decades of jet contrails has dispersed over much the earth. I don't even
carry antything as weak as a yellow filter anymore. A lot is changing quickly. Glaciers I could glissade on for a couple miles just twenty years ago
are totally gone now. Vast tracts of our North American pine forests have died to beetle kill - insects that now survive in mass during winter because it has become warm - with massive forest fires erupting in Canada and even Alasksa, not to mention here. Apparently Photoshop arrived just in time,
because at the rate we're going, a make-believe world is all we're going to have left! In the meantime, I want my own pictures to at least approximate something I actually saw and directly experienced. I recall maneuvering my 8x10 for the evening colors over a particular peak that
were an incredible purple-apricot color I've only seen twice in my life. In this instance it was due to the high altitude dust created by the Mt Pinatubo
eruption in Indonesia. If I showed that big chrome to anyone today, they'd simply shrug their shoulders and respond with a "Hey, Dooood, I can do
better than that in Photoshop, or with my tinted grad filter". It's already happened. But they never LIVED any of it. Virtual experience doesn't count.