ND and Grad ND Filter Use

[sapper6fd]

Ok so I picked up a 2 stop Grad ND filter the other day. Went out into the mountains and tried to use it for the first time. After the first few shots I realized I have a few questions on its use.

When taking a shot without it the camera meters and boom - the shot it taken. When using the Grad ND filter the camera meters and takes the shot. but when metering with the filter in front of the lens, the spec change and the shutter speed is dropped a bit to compensate for the difference in light rejected by the filter - which in turn defeats the purpose of the filter.

My question is should I be metering and then shooting in manual mode with the specs shown before placing the filter in front of the lens? If the forground is properly exposed at 1/1000 of a second, the 2 stop ND filter should be properly exposing for the background at this setting. Yet the ND filter causes the shutter speed to drop to 1/500 which is now properly exposing the background but the forground is underexposed.

I should also mention I am shooting in Appeture priority mode.

Your help is greatly apreciated!

Cheers,

Sapper

 

[CouncilmanDoug]

shoot in manual. problem solved

 

[tirediron]

shoot in manual. problem solved

Not really quite that simple...

The perfect solution is to spot meter the foreground over several areas, then spot meter the background over several areas, and determine an average exposure for both, then, in manual dial on the exposure settings for the darker of the two (usually the foreground) and use the difference in stops to determine which ND filters you're going to use. If you're not familiar with spot metering or don't want to get quite that involved, you will usually get a decent exposure by metering the scene as you would, and, with those settings dialed on, just attach the G-ND.

 

[KmH]

Which of the 3 or 4 metering modes your camera has available was in use?

 

[sapper6fd]

Not really quite that simple...

The perfect solution is to spot meter the foreground over several areas, then spot meter the background over several areas, and determine an average exposure for both, then, in manual dial on the exposure settings for the darker of the two (usually the foreground) and use the difference in stops to determine which ND filters you're going to use. If you're not familiar with spot metering or don't want to get quite that involved, you will usually get a decent exposure by metering the scene as you would, and, with those settings dialed on, just attach the G-ND.

Thanks tirediron. I was thinking it was something along these lines. I'm going to need to figure hour my spot metering mode.

KmH,

I was in matrix metering mode for the shots I was taking.