# I have watched the J Brady tuts on the Sekonic website BUT!!!!



## russellsnr (Dec 8, 2012)

Hi, I have watched the J Brady tuts on the Sekonic website.
 The landscape ones are the ones I am interested in but I am a little confused now when it comes to metering the landscape, in the tuts he states that a Canon camera (most of them) can capture around 2 1/2 stops up or down either side of the meter reading then while he is out he states that he is adjusting 2 stops for the clouds and 2 stops for the polarizing filter (when used) he then says that equates to 100th sec from the 1600th sec original reading , but is that original reading already minus 2 stops down for the fact that the camera can capture that 2 or 2 1/2 stops either side of a reading? Hope someone understands the question.
 Thanks
 Russ


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## PlanetStarbucks (Dec 8, 2012)

Yeh, he's adjusting down 4 stops total.  Each iteration of stop is half (going darker) or twice (going lighter) the amount of light.  

In shutter time it's fairly easy to wrap your head around the math.  What he's saying is that the meter is telling him the proper exposure is 1/1600th but because of the environment and filter he wants to brighten it by four stops.  Clouds and the filter are dark, so he needs to make it lighter.  Four stops down from 1600 is 800 (1)> 400 (2)> 200 (3)> 100 (4).

This is seperate from the dynamic range of the camera.  When you're out shooting there is there is a potential range of light levels from nothing (true black) to practical infinity (the sun).  All optics have a dynamic range at which they can still resolve detail.  Your eye is actually really good at it, but the camera less so.  He's saying the camera sensor itself can capture detail over the range plus or minus 2 stops.  In less photo-jargony terms, that means that the sensor can see and resolve detail down to light 1/4th and up to 4 times of where it's metered.  Anything outside that range will either be pure black or pure white.  This is the battle that landscapists have, finding where that magic exposure is and if you have more dynamic range than the camera can handle how to compromise or cheat.


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## russellsnr (Dec 9, 2012)

PlanetStarbucks said:


> Yeh, he's adjusting down 4 stops total.  Each iteration of stop is half (going darker) or twice (going lighter) the amount of light.
> 
> In shutter time it's fairly easy to wrap your head around the math.  What he's saying is that the meter is telling him the proper exposure is 1/1600th but because of the environment and filter he wants to brighten it by four stops.  Clouds and the filter are dark, so he needs to make it lighter.  Four stops down from 1600 is 800 (1)> 400 (2)> 200 (3)> 100 (4).
> 
> This is seperate from the dynamic range of the camera.  When you're out shooting there is there is a potential range of light levels from nothing (true black) to practical infinity (the sun).  All optics have a dynamic range at which they can still resolve detail.  Your eye is actually really good at it, but the camera less so.  He's saying the camera sensor itself can capture detail over the range plus or minus 2 stops.  In less photo-jargony terms, that means that the sensor can see and resolve detail down to light 1/4th and up to 4 times of where it's metered.  Anything outside that range will either be pure black or pure white.  This is the battle that landscapists have, finding where that magic exposure is and if you have more dynamic range than the camera can handle how to compromise or cheat.



Hi, Thanks for the reply, I now got my head round it.
Russ


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