On 11 Dec 2002 06:18:54 -0800, dpcwilbur@excite.com (Collin Brendemuehl) wrote:

>As indicated by so many of the responses,
>what you mean by "accurate metering" is rather important.
>
>There's something else critical here. Most 35mm cameras do NOT
>have shutters whose accuracy equals the metering system, especially
>at higher shutter speeds.

I don't think this is true, anymore, except maybe
at the top speed (a rarely-used 1/4000th or 1/8000th...).
For the most-used shutter speeds, electronic control
has made them quite accurate in many models. The meters and metering methods, though.... (see below).

>If you pick up a Canon, Minolta, Olympus, Pentax, & Nikon.
>Set them to the same settings, and shoot the same scene,
>you may well see a difference. Print film can handle this
>tolerance. It will show up on slides. It may be as little as
>+/- 1/4 stop, but shadow areas Will show that total 1/2 stop difference.

This can happen due to different multi-area
averaging-algorithms, to inaccuracies in actual
vs. "numbered" apertures, and to meter miscalibrations
(surprisingly common...).

>So, if you're wanting perfect exposures, the meter is not the real
>issue. It's knowing how your equipment will behave and adjusting
>to this discrepency.

True for the second, but I commonly find meters off
from my standard by 1/3rd to 1/2 stop (and sometimes
more). This would produce incorrect averages of exposures
for slide film (1/4-stop is quite noticeable with slides, particularly if applied to many exposures - the
average
becomes wrong...).

>If 1/500 is actually 1/480 and f11 is actually f10.5, but you get used to
>seeing the right numbers but not the predictable results on the film.
>(very slightly more or less light than expected,
> very slightly more or less DOF than calculated)
>Know your equipment and get from it the results you want.
>Work around mechanical tolerances.

This may not be practical for most people, since most are
unaware that their meters may be off a bit, their lenses'
marked stops are often incorrect (especially wide open, and
near the smallest stops), and that in some modes, exposures
may be limited to 1/4 or 1/6-stop increments, with setting
exact in-between values impossible...
The very best metering for correct exposure, I think, comes
with experience placing a range of subject tones in a large
center-patch metering area of a TTL-metering camera with a
good electronically-timed shutter and calibrated meter
(likely used in manual-exposure mode...) using "stop-down"
metering to get around the aperture errors. Experience
would include knowing how to get around the errors from
predominant non-middle-grey subject tones, and predominant
strong-color areas. BTW, spot-metering, without even
more experience and MUCH more time used in arriving at
the exposure settings than is required for the above,
is likely the fastest way to poor exposures for most
people (or, just which tone really is "middle-grey",
and, is it still middle-grey if it is bright red...? ;-).