metering from the hand

["Douglas McLernon" <Douglas.McLernon@tcd.ie>]

Using a reading from the hand with a reflected light meter for normal
Caucasian skin gives a reading of "about" zone 6 on the Ansel Adams scale -
not 18% gray. The answer is to open up one stop. For dark skinned people a
reading from the palm of the  hand does produce around 18% on a gray scale.
The light falling on the hand must, of course be the same as that falling
on the subject. The old rule of reflected metering from the shadow area and
closing down two stops for black and white still holds but don't forget the
zone system was developed for single sheet large negative film. Modern
cameras with averaging, matrix, and spot meters used properly take the
guess work out of most of the problems.  I find incident metering best for
transparencies. I agree the Sekonic 308 is a first class meter, small and
accurate.
Regards 
Doug