Metering - Spot or Matrix?

[kundalini]

Do you have an aversion to Center-Weighted metering?

Page 105 in your user manual has a desrciption of how each metering mode determines its exposure.

 

[joealcantar]

I use spot for the most part, but here is some decent reading, consider the AE/AF Lock option button if your camera has one to help you lock the settings.
Understanding Metering and Metering Modes
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Shoot well, Joe

 

[D-B-J]

Depends on how you want the camera to read the scene. Do you want highlights and shadows clipped, for an overall even exposure (Matrix).
Do you want the focal point of the scene to be properly exposed, regardless of the surroundings (spot)
Do you want the focal point to be properly exposed, but maybe slightly under, to afford a slight compromise between the focal point and the background? (center weighted)

 

[IgsEMT]

Let me take a stab at this
On y Nikons I use center weight. As was discussed matrix (whole scene), center ( concentrating on specific area of the scene ) and spot that spot
I found that when I'm shooting, especially outdoors (whether it's a bride or a kid) matrix, by reading the whole scene would underexpose my flash output. Spot varies TREMENDOUSLY if I'm pointing at the white dress or black tux. The only other option is center-weight and right now using recall what it's called on Canon.
Since I went digital and more specifically upgraded to d200, I spend more time with flash in ttl then in manual. Not that I don't switch to M here and there but 8/10 times nailing the exposure is good enough for me - and after experimenting it's in centerWeight where all of my cameras sit. This applies to when I'm using my studio lights, ocf, Nikon's cls, etc. The only other time I'll switch to matrix is when shooting landscapes and that hasn't happen in yrs. Friend of mine shoots with his d3 only in spot metering, he feels that it's more accurate while his d700 which (9/10times mounted only with fisheye) set to matrix w/o flash.
Another 2 colleagues of mine on there 5dm2 shoot in (what's called matrix on nikon). Though they shoot 50/50 manual/ttl flash, still feel that it's more accurate that way.
It's a preference, u have to experiment w/ it.
Good luck

 

[ZapoTeX]

I'll drop my two cents as well.

You half press the shutter, the camera takes a meter reading. If the line is to the left of the meter, you are under exposed. So you have to let more light in to get a well exposed image.

I definitely do not want to contradict Bigtwinky, who sure knows about exposure a lot more than I do, but this not necessarily true. This is only true if what you're shooting is a gray surface.

Try to use spot metering, Av exposure, manual focus set completely out of focus, and shoot a white sheet of paper. Then do the same with a black sheet of paper. In the pictures they will look the same color, a grayish sheet of paper.

This is because a white sheet of paper reflects a lot more light and the camera thinks that there is more light. A black sheet of paper reflects very little and the camera thinks you're in a really dark place and uses longer times.

Exposure meters are designed to set the exposure in such a way that the picture is a very well defined shade of gray.

Now, suppose that you're shooting in M mode. You have a white sheet of paper in front of you and you're still using spot metering. If you want it to be white in the picture, you need to set time and aperture (and ISOs of course) so that the indicator in the viewfinder reads an overexposure of 1 to 3 stops (depending on the type of paper, the dynamic range of the sensor or the film, whether it directly reflects light, etc... An opaque sheet of paper with a Nikon camera will look realistically white at about +1.5).

Suppose that you're shooting a black handbag. In order to make it black, you need to read about -2 or -3, depending on how reflective the handbag is.

Spot metering can be used either to make sure a single part of the photo is well exposed and who cares of the rest, or to "explore" the whole scene and make sure that all the different colors and brightnesses of the surfaces you're shooting are well rendered.

Another "exposure bible" is Ansel Adams, "The Negative: Exposure and Development". You can also get a glimpse by reading: Zone System - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

One last note: Nikon claims that the matrix metering looks at the whole picture, compares it with thousands of pictures in their database and calculates the right exposure based on the colors and shapes that you're shooting. Besides the fact that I don't know how they do (unless you use live view), it does not always work. For example, try this on a street: select matrix, Aperture priority. Shoot a photo of a white care passing by. Then wait for a black car to pass by in the exact same position as the white one was and shoot it from the exact same angle (well, not really "exact"... it's not that you need a tripod, but the light conditions must be identical). Then look at the color of the tarmac in the two photos and you'll see that it is different. Doesn't that suck?


I'm far from an expert, I learned all this few months ago and I'm still struggling to put it into practice. A good exercise is to:
1) Explore the scene with spot metering and decide the exposure that makes the whites white, the blacks black, etc...
2) Shoot
3) Switch to Aperture priority and Matrix metering
4) Shoot again
5) Compare: did the matrix decide the same exposure as you did? If not, which one of the two photos looks more like the real scene in front of you? The first times that you realize that your manual choice was better than matrix, you'll love it!

 

[bigtwinky]

^^ Awesome info there.

The camera does seek to bring things to an 18% "neutral" grey. Which is why, in the city example I gave just before, the camera can't handle the entire scene.

If you meter for the sky, it will seem very bright, and the camera will bring down the exposure to an 18% grey level. The flip side of this is that the areas that are darker than the sky will also be brought down. The person in the front who is in the shade will come out dark.

Same for if you expose for the person. The camera sees it as dark, so it has to up the overall exposure. By upping it, the brighter areas (ie the sky) also get brighter, hence the over exposed skies in many vacation pictures.

And PLEASE contradict me. I love being wrong as it allows me to learn.

 

[KmH]

The bottom line is: each metering mode has it's uses, so you need to be intimately familiar with all of them.

There is no better initial source of information about your specific camera than your camea's user's manual. Nikon user's manuals have a nice index in the back. The more familiar you are with Nikon terminology the easier it is to find things in the index.

Page 324 of the D7000 manual shows that page 105 is where metering is covered.

When you go into that little room in the house that is used for building model rockets, take your user's manual with you and choose a section of the manual to read/re-read as you create your newest model rocket.

 

[ZapoTeX]

Thanks Bigtwinky! Glad you liked it! It was for sure more useful for me to write it (to confirm that I understood at least the theory) than for you to read it

See you around!

 

[RebeccaAPhotography]

Gosh I need to save this thread. I am finding this really hard to understand. I'm gonna save this whole thread to my comp so I can read and reread it (while building model rockets lol!)

Thanks for the good advice now I just need to COMPUTE it better LOL