Advice needed: Early EOS matrix meters in the snow?

[theolj28]

I have an Elan II (EOS 50/55) which has been very reliable for me thus far. Next month, I want to take it to the rockies with some Ektachrome for some landscapes and I was wondering if anyone has experience working with the old Canon six-segment evaluative meter in snow. The meter is the same as the one present in the Rebel G (EOS 500N), Elan (EOS 100), 630, 650, 620 and original EOS-1 models. In the past I've used my 6D with no exposure compensation, and it's always done well, as well as spot-metering separately for shots on an old OM-1. Do you think any Exposure Compensation or ISO change is needed in your experience? Any and all advice is appreciated. Thanks.

[Ken Katz]

I still own an Elan IIE, and my recollection of discussions about its evaluative meter (a few decades ago), I believe that it may be smart enough to know when metering level exceeds sunny 16, that you are likely shooting on a bright day on snow or sand, and increase exposure to compensate.  In less bright conditions, it certainly will not know if it's meter is looking  at glacier or a coal mine, so compensation would be needed.  I would check evaluative meter against the center weighted and limited area readings before shooting.  With slide film, in high contrast or backlight images, I would check shadow and highlights using the limited area meter, if I had time.  The evaluative meter in the EOS 3 was more reliable. 

A 6D has a far more sophisticated meter system, and you can always review the histogram to confirm exposure.

[Ken Katz]

Knowledge from ancient times (pre digital).  Seems to confirm my comments.

http://www.bobatkins.com/photography/eosfaq/eosfaq24/9miscellany.html#q20

 

[theolj28]

Thank you Ken! Exactly what I was looking for.

[glen_h]

Meters are designed to expose for a 18% reflectance.

Originally we only had averaging meters, which work better than might be expected.

 

But even with matrix metering, if the scene is mostly white, it will still try to expose for 18%.

The snow will come out gray.  That is, when snow is a large part of the scene.

 

On the other hand, reversal films tend to do better with a little underexposure,

and bad with even a tiny bit overexposure.  Balance that with above.

Edited December 8, 2022 by glen_h
got the 18% wrong again

[hjoseph7]

19 hours ago, glen_h said:

Meters are designed to expose for a 18% reflectance.

Originally we only had averaging meters, which work better than might be expected.

 

But even with matrix metering, if the scene is mostly white, it will still try to expose for 18%.

The snow will come out gray.  That is, when snow is a large part of the scene.

 

On the other hand, reversal films tend to do better with a little underexposure,

and bad with even a tiny bit overexposure.  Balance that with above.

The thing about Matrix Metering is that sometimes it will try to get by the 18% grey rule even though you have a white object as part of your subject. Meaning that it will evaluate the entire scene and based on the amount of white reflected from that the scene it might, or might not change that white object to 18% grey.

I once ran an experiment as part of an assignment, with a white shirt as the main subject, however I was surprised when I looked at the final images and saw that the white shirt still looked pretty white in almost all the frames and not grey ?

What the meter usually does depending on the reflection of the white subject, is underexpose the entire scene. It might underexpose by 2 stops, 1 1/2 stops, 1 stop or even less. The reason why it's hard to tell if anything happened, is because if the entire scene is underexposed the white object will still look brighter than the rest of the objects in the scene and may even appear to be white.

Today I was photographing a home in bright daylight. The home had a garage with a big white door. This white door was reflecting a lot of light on my exposure meter, so what the meter did was under expose the entire scene. House, trees, sky, every thing was underexposed. Actually the white garage door now looked pretty greyish on my back LCD, not bright white.

I remembered what I learned throughout the years, so I first bummped up the exposure by 2 notches. Not 2 whole stops, but 2/3 stops. The exposure scale on the Canon cameras is separated in 1/3 increments. After I did that, the entire scene was properly exposed and the door in the picture looked like the one in the scene. if I had bumped up the exposure by 1 whole stop,  or maybe even 2 whole stops, that door might have started looking "Radioactive"  like it was glowing or something. 

Since you are using film and since you are not certain how the Matrix/Evaluative metering  in your camera is going to react in the snow, I would bring a grey-card along and maybe do a Custom White Balance. This way you will be sure your pictures will be properly exposed. The only thing about Custom White Balances is that if the light changes suddenly(such as a cloud blocks the sun), then you have to do another Custom White Balance to take in consideration the change in light.  good Luck !