Metering question - Nikon FE

[jcdeboever]

Additionally, cameras this old are bound to have slower shutter speeds.

 

[table1349]

 

[Dave Colangelo]

That image was perfectly exposed based on the way the meter in the FE works. This was hit on in earlier posts but ill elaborate a bit. The Nikon cameras of this era have a very heavy center weighted meter. In other words think of it like having a few spot meters in the center of the finder that are averaged out. There is a nice overview here but basically anything within the larger circle is where the meter pulls the majority of its info. in your case the sky was metered correctly while the trees were left dark. This is the result of the sky comprising enough light to bias the meter in its exposure decision as well as falling within the center weighting area. There is a shot somewhere in the middle where both the skys and trees are exposed better but its a tricky shot on any note. A graduated ND would help quite a bit here. But to me it looks like your camera is working just fine.

One nice way to use the old units like this to get a tough shot is basically to point the center of the camera at various parts of the image and see what shutter speed it wants to use in auto (really aperture priority). This makes it sort of a poor mans spot meter. You can then apply some thoughts on the zone system and decide on your exposure.

 

[table1349]

 

[Steve Fretz]

The F3 meter is strongly center-weighted, the FE less so, but your point is well-taken. Bright lights can trick the meter. (Unfortunately I'd sold my FA before I became a serious night photog)

With experience you get a sense of when this happens - all your other exposures in the area were one-two minutes, then suddenly it takes half a second. Unfortunately no film camera I know of will give you a meter reading longer than one second; I use my D600 sometimes for metering night shots cause that'll go out to 30 seconds. Meter with it wide open, aiming at the darker areas in the photo, and then extrapolate.

If using an FE with print film, I'd always take a safety shot with +2 exposure comp. If you want a rule of thumb, one minute at F8/F5.6 with Portra 160 will almost always give you something usable. A really dense neg is a lot better than one that's too thin.

My Flickr has a bunch of analog night shots on it, and when I remember it I post the exposure data in the description field: Steve Fretz

 

[table1349]

 

[benhasajeep]

Hahahaha, Nice Zombie thread.

But, I'm going to pile on. I have new light seals for my FE. Just need to find the time to replace them.