[Leica] incident

["Rod Fleming" <rodfleming@sol.co.uk>]

Hi

Bernard wrote

>But if you'd give him a 5 degree attachment for Christmas, he just
might.>

(In reply to my statement about the relative accuracy of Incident meters.)


Bernard, why would I do that, when I have his pals Mr Pentax Spotmeter and
Mr Sekonic Spotmeter sitting right beside him?

And in any case, the same meter is equally accurate in all situations. It
does not matter what the attachments are. Same meter=same degree of
accuracy.

Accuracy, as far as lightmeters are concerned, is about the tolerances
within which an instrument will provide a measurement of the light falling
on its sensitive area. The _method_ in which the instrument is used is
something else altogether.

On another point, Eric's rebuttal of Frank's suggestion that all meters are
incident meters is wholly correct. Frank is indeed "flat wrong" and would
appear to misapprehend the terms "incident" and "reflected" in this context.
Possibly Frank has failed to grasp the importance of the selectivity allowed
by using a reflected meter in conjuction with a Zone system of analysis.

Whatever, Eric's point that using certain methods of measuring reflected
light can allow a considered placing of tonal values on the exposure scale
is THE point here. The incident method CANNOT provide the information
necessary to do that. (Mark you, neither can using a wide-field reflected
meter from well back; you need to use a spotmeter or the widefield meter
close in.)

If you don't understand the principles of exposure, then go ahead and use an
incident meter. Most times you'll get an acceptable result. You'll just
never know why. But in part photography is about having fun, and if you just
want to take pictures and are not interested in the techie stuff, that's
fine- I for one am certainly not criticising. At least you're taking
pictures. Just avoid taking pictures in the situations where you actually do
need to know what's going on.

Not all scenes reflect 18%, and amongst those that do, the relative emphasis
we wish to give to elements within the scene, in our representation of it,
may not be that which we will arrive at by following the assumptions made
when using an incident metering method.

Photography is about reflected light, not about incident light. The film in
our cameras is not exposed by the light falling on a subject, it is exposed
by the light reflected from it. It therefore follows that the most useful
method of exposure determination is one that measures this directly- the
reflected  light method. But in order to use the information given by that
method we need  either to know how to apply some sort of zone system, or be
sufficiently experienced to determine the right exposure "by the seat of our
pants". The fact that this might require a little bit of study and practise
on the part of the photographer just proves the rule that nothing good comes
easy. Why should photography be different from any other art?

On a final point, I too have come across my share of situations where a
bunch of smudgers were waving their meters around and comparing readings. I
just ignore 'em. I think they're just trying to be friendly. It's a kind of
code. It beats sticking their elbows in each others' faces and kicking each
others' shins.

Cheers


Rod