Exposure Study

Proteus617

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Playing around with the asterisk button on my camera, trying to teach my eye to see in exposure values. The basic idea was to blow out the windows as little as possible while still capturing some detail in the room. Film: Delta 400, no post processing except for minor cropping. Tear em up!

SGWin1A.jpg


SGWin2A.jpg


SGWin3A.jpg
 
Well, I'm no expert by a long shot but that first one is really cool.
 
dear proteus,

its good to find someone playing around with one of the limitations of photography ! :) you did a fairly nice job with these images, although the details in the room aren't right thoroughly visible.

I myself am not sure what to do in conditions such as these. the windows would blow the hell out of themselves if you Spot or Center-Weight meter the room to get details. thats why I shoot them just as you did but at as low an ISO (ASA) value as possible, then rely upon my softwares to do the detailing work. When you make Shadow/Highlight corrections in PS or Fill-light in LR, you face the drawback of grains coming out if you switch onto a faster film.

Its true - clicking a photograph is only 40% of the job. a major part of the rest of the workflow involves digital editing... there's also another possibility to use diffused artificial lights around the room to take out some detail but thats not always possible, is it ?

let me know if you have suggestions over the matter.

greetings ~*
 
Something i was told by an old timer a long time ago, and never tried...
Reciprocate the exposure values. I.e. take the reciprocal of the exposure you get and center weight the values as if you were trying for a NEGATIVE image rather than a positive. I was told this, but never tried it, and this post reminded me of that advice. Try it and see. I don't know if it will work or not. if not, oh well. If so..
Then................
 
a major part of the rest of the workflow involves digital editing...
:lmao:


Anyway, brilliant job on that first shot. That's probably the widest exposure latitude I've ever seen out of Delta.
 
If you want some shadow detail while retaining high-lights in high contrast lighting situations...

Over-expose the film 1 and 2 stops
and
reduce development about 15%
 
You did a good job with film. The rage at the moment seems to be High Dynamic Range in the digital world, where you would take a number of exposures on a solid tripod, say 5, 7 or 9 photo's at bracketed exposures of 1 EV and digitally combine them, so you extend the dynamic range from deep shadows to bright highlights.

I'm afraid after years of film photography, I have crossed over to the digital side.
 
...the rest of the workflow involves digital editing... there's also another possibility to use diffused artificial lights around the room to take out some detail but thats not always possible, is it ?

let me know if you have suggestions over the matter.

Sayambhu, thanks for the advice! I didn't capture nearly as much of the rooms as intended and it would be fun to repeat the test. I don't have a flash, but the exposures are long enough to do some light painting?
 
Reciprocate the exposure values. I.e. take the reciprocal of the exposure you get and center weight the values as if you were trying for a NEGATIVE image rather than a positive.

Could you help me out with the reciprocal an exposure value? For eg., shot #2. Spot metered on the window, F13 at 1 sec. the reciprocal would be?
 
Sorry...but why did you take a spot reading from the window???
 
Sorry...but why did you take a spot reading from the window???

Just to get me in the ballpark, and I would overexpose as much as I could from there. Too much and I would lose the bars, blackout shades and chicken wire glass. That would make them plain old rooms, not the nasty little isolation cells that they were.
 
If you want some shadow detail while retaining high-lights in high contrast lighting situations...

Over-expose the film 1 and 2 stops
and
reduce development about 15%

Pretty much. Since negative films have the greatest density in the highlights, that's where alot of the detail is, those dark areas on the negative, while there's less density in the shadows.

You can shoot again, expose more for the shadows, and than burn the window while in a real darkroom, under an enlarger.
 
Agreed

Holding the detail in the windows while opening up the shadows just a tad would add a lot more impact. The "cell" effect you are interested in will still be there.

This is a good case for knowing how to manipulate tonal range.
(refer to the zone system...)
 

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