Posted by Danny Laureys on March 31, 2008 at 10:49 AM
Hi,
Got myself a 2 stop Lee Graduated ND filter this weekend, did some research on how to expose with it, found different answers, some say expose first without the filter on foreground,and others, like in an article from John Shaw, say to expose first with filter in place on sky. anyone have any suggestions. Thank you for your time
Put the filter in place as it needs to be being careful about where the grad line is (use DOF preview at the aperture you plan to use) - then make your exposure. Check your histogram and make adjustments in exposure as necessary (e.g. to get a histogram biased to the right without clipping highlihgts). It is that simple. Darwin
Posted by Danny Laureys on March 31, 2008 at 1:46 PM
Darwin, Thanks for the info, I'll try it out. By the way I checked out you'r webside, your pictures are fantastic, great photography.
Posted by Kah Kit Yoong on March 31, 2008 at 10:39 PM
I just wrote an article about this which appears on this months TPN edition.
http://www.travelphotographers.net/articles/articles0804/ky0804-article.html
The real key here is to understand the concept of why you're using a grad ND in the first place.
If you understand that your sensor or film can handle only a narrow range of light, and you know how to determine if the scene in front of you falls into the sensor's or film's range, and you know how to determine which filter to use to capture that range of light, then it really doesn't matter which order you do things in.
Personally, I prefer determining what the foreground exposure needs to be first by spot metering on a foreground element. I then spot meter the brightest part of the background in which I want to hold detail and determine the proper exposure to render that element the way I want it to look. The difference in exposure (in stops) determines what filter I use. But I could just as easily start by spot metering the highlight and determine the difference by spot metering the foreground.
Here's another article that might help.
One thing if you're going to meter through the filter. Make sure that your metering is in evaluative mode or something along those lines that looks at the entire scene. If you are spot metering or even center weighted, the position of your grad can screw up your results. In evaluative, it will look at the whole image to set metering.
Discussion
8 repliesGot myself a 2 stop Lee Graduated ND filter this weekend, did some research on how to expose with it, found different answers, some say expose first without the filter on foreground,and others, like in an article from John Shaw, say to expose first with filter in place on sky. anyone have any suggestions. Thank you for your time
http://www.travelphotographers.net/articles/articles0804/ky0804-article.html
Thanks for webside, very helpful
If you understand that your sensor or film can handle only a narrow range of light, and you know how to determine if the scene in front of you falls into the sensor's or film's range, and you know how to determine which filter to use to capture that range of light, then it really doesn't matter which order you do things in.
Personally, I prefer determining what the foreground exposure needs to be first by spot metering on a foreground element. I then spot meter the brightest part of the background in which I want to hold detail and determine the proper exposure to render that element the way I want it to look. The difference in exposure (in stops) determines what filter I use. But I could just as easily start by spot metering the highlight and determine the difference by spot metering the foreground.
Here's another article that might help.
Thanks for all the info on this topic, its been all very helpfull. Thanks again
One thing if you're going to meter through the filter. Make sure that your metering is in evaluative mode or something along those lines that looks at the entire scene. If you are spot metering or even center weighted, the position of your grad can screw up your results. In evaluative, it will look at the whole image to set metering.
Mel-