Scene metering with Leica M

Hi All,

 

Wanted to ask a question of the group not so much for lack of my own

method, but to see how others handle metering a scene with the TTL

meter of the M series (sorry to all of those using pre-TTL meter

equiped cameras, but feel free to chime in anyway).

 

I have used and become addicted to the very precise spot meter

feature of my Nikon F4 (need to drag that camera out of the

closet...I miss it dearly). Anyway, I have become very proficient at

metering a scene and determining an exposure using the spot feature.

 

With the Leica however, the metering system is in my opinion best

described as "center weighted". Without the ability to meter a very

precise 2 or 4 degree spot, how do you handle your scene metering?

 

In the two years since I began using my M6, I have become pretty

good at determining exposure, based on what I would call "my own

zone system".

 

How do you meter a scene?

 

Thanks in advance for your insight. As always, I am more that

confident I will learn something new from all of you.

 

Erik.

 

PS: If you have a good image to post as an example with a

description of how you metered the scene, I think that would be a

great learning tool for all of us.

When I have my CL I use its very precise spot meter to take a reading off the palm of my hand. I usually use my Weston Master V with the Invercone incident light attachment. Probably half the time I base my exposure on what I used last time I photographed in that location (or similar) under those lighting conditions.

I too will use my hand as a grey card. If I have the luxury, I will walk around the area for a while just metering different objects and areas, sort of drawing a map in my head of the light; then I put the settings in the middle and tweak it for each shot based roughly on my little metering map. I use pretty forgiving film too, so am not overly obsessed with nailing the exposure too precisely. Nor do my socks generally match.

 

I try to get it someplace between the lines and then figure I can pull out my image in the darkroom if I really screw it up. Sometimes I really screw it up.

I use the sunny 16 rule and hardly use the in camera meter. The

Meter in the M7 is very accurate and my Pre TTL is a good

referance point, but I prefer to use the F/16 rule and my

instinct...a Sekonic hand meter is helpful when my instinct craps

out:)

Mark, Sunny 16 with an M7!!!?? ;) I used sunny 16 when I had meterless M's, but exposures are definitely more consistent with the M6 and 7 meters. I use the meter as you would a spot, but just meter a larger tonal area which is usually available in a scene. AE lock on the M7 eliminates the need to use manual mode at all, the camera can remain in AE mode for any kind of shooting. If it's a fast moving situation or spur of the moment shot, I just have the f/stop somewhere in the ballpark where I want it, and shoot.

Uh, should say <i>focus</i> and shoot.

With my M6TTL, I try to imagine the circular white spot, from which light readings are taken, to occupy just less that half the height of appropriate frameline in the viewfinder image. I try to meter on an area that is representative of 18% grey, like dry asphalt, green grass, the palm of my hand (+ 1 stop), a clear blue sky, equal proportions of dark and bright reflecting areas, etc. This seems to work OK for me but, since I use print film, there is some room for error in my metering. If I used slide film, I might have to improve my technique and/or use a separate incident light meter more often than I do.

 

What I find helps to prevent my exposures being all over the map, as Kirk Tuck says in his photo.net review of the M6, is the lack of auto-exposure (such as is found in the M7). Once I have set the aperture/shutter speed combination to match the film-speed and available light, I don't change it unless the light changes. I find I'm getting more consistent results than with my old Olympus OM-2n, which I always set to auto-exposure because I believed that the silicon blue diodes, which were used for taking a centre-weighted light reading from the film plane with that camera in auto mode, gave a more accurate result than the CdS cells that were used to take a centre-weighted reading from the focusing screen in manual mode.

 

I think I was correct in that belief; however, I failed to take account of the fact that the resulting exposure could vary wildly from shot to shot, because of different camera positions/angles, even though the intensity of the incident light remained the same. So, IMHO, manually setting the exposure is a better technique to achieve consistent results than auto-exposure which, while it does simplify and speed up shooting, needs to be used with care.

I use a 20 year old Minolta Spot meter, with M4-P and Hexar RF. If you are using print film and the subject is not backlit, or on snow the built in meter will work reasonably well. However for slides and complicated lighting forget it. This also goes for SLR's with matrix metering.

 

Gerry

With the M6TTL meter, I point it at the darkest part of the scene or

area lit like the scene. I shoot B&W so it's all in the shadows

anyway. But, mostly I use my Gossen Luna-Pro Digital F meter.

Despite that Erwin disagrees, there is no physical evidence to support the notion that the M6/M7 meter is "weighted". The meter cell reads off the white spot, which has very sharp borders. For the 50 and 90 lenses it only works to imagine a circle in the framelines the proportion of the spot to the film opening, at the closest focusing distance, because beyond that the image is larger than the framelines. At normal shooting distances you have to imagine the circle proportional to the actual framed area: the black eyepiece border for 50mm, and 75mm framelines for the 90mm.

 

Because the meter is a large spot, sometimes I need to move in to include a single tone in the metered area. In practice it works as well for me as a spotmeter. And with the wider lenses, switching to a 90 or 135 to take the reading is an effective albeit slow way of narrowing the reading angle.

The center weighted meter on any modern camera is a true gift. It is fast. It will always get you a picture.

 

In less hurried shooting, it will give good exposures in most situations, if the photographer will constantly think in terms of the metered circle as being 18% gray, and if it isn't, then add or subtract some exposure reading the meter gives. If its a snow scene, open up. If its a black cat in the coal bin, stop down. One stop, two stops. Observe and learn from the feed back. You will best know how you are doing from a contact sheet with varied subject matter. Make some tests, do some brackiting (half stop in color, full stop in b+w), take some notes. (Take lots of notes that you can read aginst the images when you get them.) Like all photo routines, it will become intuitive.

 

And for those of you who don't do their own developing and printing, forget sophisticted exposure except for color slide. In prints not made by you or a pro lab, you won't be able to tell the difference because the tech or machine will try to print all your careful tests and exposures the same. (That's why a contact sheet is so valuable). So for serious tests, use color transparency or b+w contact sheets.

"And for those of you who don't do their own developing and printing, forget sophisticted exposure except for color slide. In prints not made by you or a pro lab, you won't be able to tell the difference because the tech or machine will try to print all your careful tests and exposures the same. (That's why a contact sheet is so valuable). So for serious tests, use color transparency or b+w contact sheets."

 

This is not entirely true. On the back of each machine print is a density number, which indicates whether the technician made the print darker or lighter in order to achieve "optimal" brightness. The density reading is usually the fourth in a series of numbers which also includes yellow, magenta and cyan settings. (+) density numbers mean that the print was made darker, and (-) density numbers mean that it was made lighter.

In the streets, on a relatively sunny day, at ei 1250, at f8 fixed, I zone focussed and meter by changing the shutter speeds between 60-250 via my forefinger.

Same as with any type meter. With color slides, I meter the scene and, from there, bracket toward underexposure. With black and white, I meter and bracket toward overexposure. Mostly I use a handheld meter for incident readings or, on reflected, meter my palm and open a stop.

You now see, Erik (original poster), how bad this crowd is..<br>

I tried to talk exactly what you are talking about - that unless one has spot and, ideally, the readings that let one see at a glance REALTIVE values in the scene, - one is relying on the film width to bear his mistakes.

<br>No one understood and the usual stupid bunch of responses followed (more ways than one, you think you are the only one that knows etc.)<p>

The ideal metering system on a camera must let one take the reading from the most critical part of the scene, let's take human skin as an example (one can use his own hand). Supposing the reading is 11EV. Then I'd look at the brighter parts (a bright wall, +2-3 EV), and something darker (-5EV). <br>

So I immediately see that if I set the camera to put skin to "zone 5", i.e. set it at the reading off skin, my wall will be bright, but will retain all details, and my shadows will most probably be black anyway. If I want shadow detail, I should set my camera at the skin reading +1 - 1.5, and lose the wall.<p>

This is full measuring. In actual shooting, often one has to think of the most important element, and let everything else fall where it falls. Then I look at someone's face, press the "spot" button, half-press my shutter, and recompose. It's less than a second. This is my most often used method, especially at night (bright lights, very abrupt light fall-offs) and in changing light condition.<br>

If I see, that the scene is lit evenly, I do NOT press my "spot" button, I shoot at centre-weighted average.<br>

Another example when spot is indispensable is silhouettes. You look with your spot at the bright "outside", half-press the shutter to lock it, then recompose. The front figures turn themselves into silhouettes.<p>

I use these techniques with my 1970s rangefinders (Olympus 35SP) putting them into shutter-preferred automatic. Fully mechanical rangefinder with 42mm/1.7, metered manual,full automatic, or shutter preferred, and automatic flash mode (you set the guide number, and the camera will correctly change aperture according to the distance read from your rangefinder; as a leaf shutter this one can use flash at ANY speed).<br>

The technology, as we see, existed more than 30 years ago, and Leica simply missed the train - or now, with M7, should I say, it caught the train 30 years later?

In the example above: to get shadow details, one has to put the camera (-1 to -1.5) compared to skin reading, so that skin becomes +1 to +1.5, shadow becomes -4 to -3.5, and the bright wall becomes +5 or more, burning out.

Michael, perhaps you should think twice before you refer to the rest of us "responders" as stupid. If you are in fact metering the face with a spot meter and using that as your camera exposure setting, you are in fact underexposing the face (and the whole picture probably), by one step. The average Caucasian human face is inherently zone VI in brightness reflectance, about 36% instead of zone V !8%. (Please notE also, Michael, that the standard terminology and on Ansel Adams published works uses the roman terminology for the zone numbers--zone VI--and not the arabic numbers, like zone 6.) Your statements and procedures appear to demonstrate a basic misunderstanding of the zone system and a flawed usage of the spot, or other, meter.

Peter Mann: thank you for the perfect illustration of my thesis. I especially liked that part where you say that zone 5 must be "Zone V", so naturally my statements demonstrate a basic misunderstanding of ... - the rest follows<p>

We should start a new non-profit society in this forum, "Stupidity Without Borders", and organize charitable actions that would benefit our brothers all around the world.<p>

M.B.<p>

P.S. When one photographs on negative film, the idea is to register all needed detail, so a face can be in zone 4, 5, or 6, or whatever legitimately. Only when your click produces the FINAL result (slide), should you be extra careful about how light or dark the face is. Even then, depending on one's artistic decision, skin can be made 5 (looks like white skin in shadow), 4, or 7, or whatever - depending on your artistic choice: how you want it to look, not what it is "in life", or "correctly".<br>

For exercise, go and browse www.magnumphotos.com, click on "photographers", then Alex Webb, and study his images: one of the strongest artists around. You'll notice, that he artificially darkens his exposures and deliberately uses very narrow film, so that his shadows go black. The artistic result is good, mucho good.<p>

Zone system is a kind of explanation of sensitometry, simplified and reduced to the basics, for practical use. However, the human monkeys are created in such a way, that now this simplification is considered something Very Advanced, and then again there is a tribe of people who read those explanations as a Rule That Human Skin MUSSST Be Zone VI, and if someone shoots by placing it in zone 6, he is already a detractor. If he puts it in 4, he must be expelled from the polite society<p>

Stupidity without borders. You passed the entrance exams.

Michael, I don't know what set you off but your initial response doesn't offer any more insight compared with all the others. Erik already acknowledged that the Leica's meter sees a bigger area than a real spot meter. If it measured a spot as small as your Olympus SP then your answer is one among may valid ways to use a spot meter. Insulting everyone else in the course of explaining how you do things doesn't make sense. Chill, dude.

Photo-snobs, ahoy! So much for kindred spirits, eh?

Michael,<br><br>

 

I don't usually respond to flame bait but you're so far off the wall this time, it's not funny. The purpose of Erik's question, to quote his own words, was: "to see how others handle metering a scene with the TTL meter of the M series." <br><br>

 

Your response included the words: "No one understood and the usual stupid bunch of responses followed (more ways than one, you think you are the only one that knows etc.)" So, Michael, you think other responders couldn't understand Erik's question and that <b>you're</b> the only one who knows? Now, why doesn't that surprise me?