How To Get Perfect Exposure Using Spot Metering And The Zone System Meter off a known area (that is, an area where you can confidently place it on the zone system). then use the distance of your subject from neutral gray (which your meter is aiming for) to dial in the proper exposure compensation. finally, take your shot! about the author. jaymes dempsey. Look at the skin tone you can see immediately that this much lighter than the middle gray that camera will try to expose for, in fact it would probably fall somewhere between vi and vii. so for this girl, i would spot meter, then expose at 1 or even 1 1 2. if i did not do this, the camera would try to darken this down to meet the middle.
How To Get Perfect Exposure Using Spot Metering And The Zone System The zones. there are ten zones in the zone system, and each zone represents a difference in exposure of one stop. the zones range from total black at zone 0 to pure white at zone x. zone system metering allows us to take a light meter reading of a subject and place it anywhere on the range of tones from total black to pure white. When using the zone system for accurate exposures, switch your camera’s metering mode to spot metering. you need to meter only a small part of the image, not the whole scene, or even the middle of the scene. spot metering is ideal for measuring exposure of the smallest area possible – just a small patch of medium gray. For example, when you meter on a dark object that falls into zone iii, your camera will read it as zone v, so it will be effectively overexposed by two stops. to get the correct exposure, you will. We will make adjustments so our shadows are in zone iii and our highlights are in zone vii. if you have a light meter dial to try the settings in this example, it will be easier to understand.
Spot Metering Achieving Perfect Exposure For example, when you meter on a dark object that falls into zone iii, your camera will read it as zone v, so it will be effectively overexposed by two stops. to get the correct exposure, you will. We will make adjustments so our shadows are in zone iii and our highlights are in zone vii. if you have a light meter dial to try the settings in this example, it will be easier to understand. Shot at 2 stops black cat is now black or zone iii. as an experiment, try photographing a piece of plain white paper. first, make sure that there is no exposure compensation added – your meter should be in the middle. take a photo. next, add 2 stops of exposure compensation. this will bring your exposure to zone vii. Whether you know it or not, if you are using spot meter, you are using the zone system. caucasian skin is metered around zone vi (zone 6 or 1 on your in camera meter). so, if you take pictures of people, and you meter off of the skin, you are using the zone system. of course we meter and adjust accordingly to get the perfect exposure.
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