06-19-2010, 01:20 AM
Dear zoners,
I am turning to you again in utter despair <img src='http://forum.photozone.de/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='
' />. I just got a light meter today, a Kenko KFM-1100 (a rebranded version of the Minolta Auto Meter V). Now I know that using a light meter is not that easy, but the basics seem straight-forward. For (flash) portraits: set camera and meter to the same ISO and exposure, set the meter to cordless flash, place it on subjects cheek (facing the camera) and take a reading (triggering the flash) and use the aperture value on the camera. The weird thing is, that I get totally overexposed shots this way - and I mean like 8 stops overexposed, not just slightly off. And I just don't see what went wrong in the process: Flash meter dome is on, the flash itself fires through a white umbrella at 1/4 power (a 580 EX II speedlite) my ISO is at 200, exposure at 1/160 s. But my meter suggests 1.4 for this setting. This can't be right! Now, the background as well as the subject's shirt are white - but since I am taking an incidend reading, the meter doesn't take that into account and assumes there's a neat wall of medium gray behind it, right? So in theory, while the white cloth will be blown out, the skin tones will be perfectly exposed. But far from it, almost all of the skin is blown out as well. I have no clue what it is I am doing wrong and so you guys are my last resort.
I am turning to you again in utter despair <img src='http://forum.photozone.de/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='
' />. I just got a light meter today, a Kenko KFM-1100 (a rebranded version of the Minolta Auto Meter V). Now I know that using a light meter is not that easy, but the basics seem straight-forward. For (flash) portraits: set camera and meter to the same ISO and exposure, set the meter to cordless flash, place it on subjects cheek (facing the camera) and take a reading (triggering the flash) and use the aperture value on the camera. The weird thing is, that I get totally overexposed shots this way - and I mean like 8 stops overexposed, not just slightly off. And I just don't see what went wrong in the process: Flash meter dome is on, the flash itself fires through a white umbrella at 1/4 power (a 580 EX II speedlite) my ISO is at 200, exposure at 1/160 s. But my meter suggests 1.4 for this setting. This can't be right! Now, the background as well as the subject's shirt are white - but since I am taking an incidend reading, the meter doesn't take that into account and assumes there's a neat wall of medium gray behind it, right? So in theory, while the white cloth will be blown out, the skin tones will be perfectly exposed. But far from it, almost all of the skin is blown out as well. I have no clue what it is I am doing wrong and so you guys are my last resort.