AI: Photography

January 01, 2005

Terms

Metering refers to using the meter in the camera or a handheld meter to help find the correct exposure for a scene. Every scene is unique and should be metered. The meter takes in the overall light in the scene and averages it so that the middle tone is 18% grey. This is often correct, but for some situations, such as strong backlight, can be misleading.

The shutter speed referes to the toal time in which the lens remains open to receive light. Most of the numbers you see are fractions of a second, so the higher the numbers are faster shutter speeds. You will also notice that the consectivite nubmers almost always halve or double, so they run 1, 2, 4, 8, 15, 30, 60, 125, 250, 500, 1000, etc. An average shutter speed would be 60 ( or 1/60 of a second). This is because at 60 the speed is fast enough to not record the normal camera shake that occurs from depressing the shutter. Changing the speed "one stop" is to move the dial from one number to the next consecutive number.

The f-stop refers to the size of the opening of the lens. The numbers you see are always fractions of the total diameter of the lens, so the larger the number, the smaller the opening, thus with a smaller opening, a lesser amount of light reaches the film plane. e.g. 2.8, 4, 5.6, 8, 11, 16, 22

Thought you cannot tell quite so easily from the numbers, the consecutive f-stops also halve or double the amount of light that enterst teh camera to hit the film. This means that changing the speed one stop is equal to changing the f-stop one stop.

If, for example, you meter a scene to be correctly exposed at a shutter speed of 30 and an f-stop of 8, that means it will still be correctly exposed at a shutter speed of 60 and an f-stop of 5.6.

Film

  • pro film has better grain structure
  • tungsten 64T is for slides of artwork
  • 160 pro color negative portraits

B & W vs. Color Film

B & W Color
Silver process C-41, E6
negative has latitude of two stops C-41 is negative "print"
E-6 is positive "slide"
C-41 makes cprint
E-6 old ilfachrome, now scan and digital
E-6 or chrome, has 2/3 stop latitude
Chrome has to be perfect exposure, no ever

Film Speed

25: technical film

50, 64, 100: little grain and low contrast

160, 200, 320, 400(T-Max): medium grain, medium contrast

800(max), 1600, 3200: big grain, high contrast

Shutter Speed, FStop, Filmspeed

Pro Film

  • finer grain
  • better contrast
  • refridgerated
  • store in cool dry place
  • kodak => warm, light yellows, pinks, oranges, better
  • fuji => cool tones, green blue darker colors, better for landscapes

fogging: exposed film or paper

Format

  • 35mm x 35mm
  • 120mm -> 2 1/4" med format
  • 4 x 5" film large format

Infrared

  • loaded in total darkness
  • store in fridge
  • entriely manual camera
  • shoot red filter

Lenses

  • 28-105 f-stop: 4.5 ~ 5.6
  • 24-70 f-stop: 28
  • zooms are slow + costly, large size, not as sharp

Advantage of Fixed

  • sharpness
  • contrast, mostly better
  • smaller
  • faster in lowlight

Wide Angle

  • smaller than standard
  • 35mm
  • opens space

Standard

  • what your eyes see & format size
  • the diag of film
  • 50mm

telephoto

  • larger than standard
  • 70 mm
  • 500 mm
  • magnify's and compresses

portrait lens

  • 100-105mm

Burning and Dodging

  • multigrade paper (#2)
  • polycontrast paper (#2)
  • filters affect contrast

00 1/2 1 1-1/2 2 2-1/2 3 3-1/2 4 4-1/2 5 <---- low contrast high contrast---->

Prints

  • blackest black
  • whitest white
  • defined edge
  • even borders

8 x 12 is full frame

Burn

  • longer exposure w/ cardboard

Dodge

  • less exposure w/ cardboard

Meters

https://sekonic.com/classroom/the-benefits-of-using-light-metering/

reflective: ball in, meter face subject incident: ball out, meter faces camera

spot meters: 1º, 3º, 5º

Use Light Meter

  1. Turn on
  2. AVG/EV = push button for no A.
  3. Push ISO and set ISO by turning dial while holding button. For thicker film, set ISO 1/2 to 1/3 stop lower (e.g. 400 -> 320), neg only
  4. set mode (ambient light, flash w/o cord, flash w/ cord)
  5. set time dial
  6. hit button on side
  7. if is a fraction (1/2s = 2)

FStop/Shutter Speed

setting - - - - -
fstop 2.8 4.0 5.6 8 11
shutter speed 1 1/2 1/4 1/8 1/16
iso 100 200 400 800 1600

Bracketing: correct exposure, 1 stop over, 1 stop under

Over/Under exposed negs

  • developing process
  • in camera

underexposed neg: thin, clear, low contrast in print

fix it in print: higher f-stop or quicktime, use a filter (high #)

overexposed: high contrast, dark print it: lower filter, lower fstop

Chemicals

Mix chemical at 1:4 ratio. mix 100mL chem, 400mL H2O

Function, dev, stop, fix, washing