Standardizing Procedures – II

Standardizing Procedures – II

 by William Lulow

TECHNIQUES TO EXPOSURE CONSISTENCY

 First, I choose a MODE that I will use for shooting. Most of the time it is MANUAL. In my case, since I have plenty of experience with traditional forms of exposure control, I want to make sure that my new, digital equipment will perform similarly to my old, traditional film cameras. Also, I have become used to predicting an exposure based on my many years of practice. I will sometimes set the camera to AUTO just for determining basic exposure, then switch to MANUAL when I determine what the correct exposure should be. I don’t use my light meter as much as I should because the technique of using the AUTO mode to determine exposure seems to work fairly well. I also rely on the in-camera exposure graph to determine if my “educated guess” is close enough. Also, because I use a 64GB card, I have more than enough room to make several exposures of a particular scene to determine which works best if my metering is slightly off.  

I go through this procedure with virtually all the settings on the camera and lens until I am satisfied that I can use all of them, shutter speeds, f/stops and all the combinations effectively to produce the kinds of images I’m after. The other very convenient thing about shooting with a digital camera and lenses is that all the exposures are set in the camera itself, not on the lens. So, you can switch lenses easily keeping the same exposure settings. This is a tremendous help to achieving exposure consistency.

Since we also import the results of our shoots to our computers, making minor changes in exposure, if needed, becomes relatively easy in Adobe Photoshop, Lightroom or Bridge. In the days of film, it was always the mark of a professional if there was consistency of exposure in a given shoot. Once you have arrived at the exposure settings you want, all images of the same type should all have the correct exposure. Only differences should be in the pose, expression, or composition. And, after you get used to setting up your standard exposure techniques, there really should be no wasted images due to bad exposures.

The same can be said for studio lighting. If you are making a portrait in the studio, the exposure is determined by the distance between your main light and the subject. Once those settings are finalized, the camera can be anywhere (unless the light is on the camera itself), and any lens can be used to produce standard exposures of your subject. You can then change your lighting for different effects knowing that the main exposure will always be correct. Here are a couple of examples:

These images are from the same shoot. Notice how the exposures on the skin are the same. The only thing different about each is the background and accent lights.

Once you have standardized your procedures, this kind of exposure control will become easier and easier to achieve.