Angmo

Hand held ambient/flash meter for me. TTL can be fooled. Incident vs reflected metering. Look it up.

The Nikon D850 is almost perfect but still...

My Medium Format film camera could provide weighted spot metering which was quite nice.

gwilliams6

Another great advantage of best EVFs, you can view the histogram right in your EVF before shooting and adjust any exposure settings and see what you will get, BEFORE you shoot. Love mirrorless for this. Never going back to my DSLRs. Cheers

hawleyrw Loc: Dayton, OH

I also use center spot focus where possible. Rare occasion I’ll vary from that

amfoto1 Loc: San Jose, Calif. USA

I shoot Canon gear and use all the metering patterns at times, but mostly use Evaluative.... which is essentially the same as Nikon's Matrix metering. With this pattern or method, the entire image area is measured, but there is extra emphasis placed on the area right around active AF point(s), which sort of assumes those AF point(s) are on the primary subject. Works well in most situations.

Canon also has Center Weighted (same as Nikon's by the same name, AFAIK). This is a simpler, "old school" metering pattern that measures the entire image area, but concentrates some extra emphasis on the center of the image. The exact shape and size of that varies brand to brand, model to model and to some extent depends upon what lens is being used on the camera... I recall Konica cameras that used a "center weighted" area that was shaped sort of like a "dog bone" and occupied between 1/4 and 2/3 the image area, depending upon lens focal length. Similar to but simpler than Evaluative/Matrix, this pattern assumes that the primary subject is in the middle of the image area. I don't often use C.W. because in my opinion Evaluative/Matrix does a better job, especially when the subject is off-center.

I also sometimes use my cameras' Spot Metering (same as Nikon's by the same name)... This measures only a tiny portion of the image area. How much varies model to model, so you should look it up for your camera. It usually seems to range from about 1.5% to around 5% of the image area. Some cameras have a circle in the center of the viewing screen that indicates the Spot metered area. Not something I'd use all the time, but Spot Metering is handy for situations with strong back lighting. Because Spot Metering only measures a small part of the scene, it's typically more critical to accurately use Exposure Compensation or tweak manual exposures with it. With the larger patterns of measurement, in most scenes there's more averaging of tonalities going on. With Spot Metering, you eliminate a lot of the tonal averaging, so have to take responsibility to adjust it yourself.

Some of the most advanced Canon have Active AF Point Linked Spot Metering. (I don't know if any Nikon do.) It's sort of like Evaluative on steroids. It's Spot Metering that's NOT locked down in the center of the image area, the way it is with most cameras. Instead, the Spot that's being metered will change and is tied to AF point(s) in use. I used this at times on my EOS-3 film cameras (even tho it reduced the camera to something like 11 AF points, instead of using all 45 points it has). But none of my Canon DSLRs have had the feature (Evaluative works similarly enough that I use it instead).

Many Canon also have Partial Metering (which I don't think Nikon do). This is really just a larger form of spot. The portion of the image being measured is more like 15% in most cameras that have it. Like Spot, it's anchored at the center of the image area (I think on all Canon... not AF Point Linked the way Spot is on a few models). I'll use this at times too, such as when working in closer to a strongly back lit subject, where they occupy much more of the image area.

So basically the only metering pattern I don't use very much with my modern DSLRs is the one you're using... Center Weighted.

I use Evaluative (i.e. Matrix) the majority of the time... and Spot or Partial for some more specialized purposes.

But, as someone else mentioned, I also carry a handheld incident/flash meter (currently a Sekonic L358). I often use this instead of the camera's meter, to set up shooting in Manual exposure mode or to confirm what I'm getting when using any of the camera's Auto Exposure modes. An incident meter measures the light falling onto a subject, rather than what's being reflected off of it (i.e., reflective metering, which is what all through-the-lens camera meter systems must do). When done correctly, incident metering can be considerably more accurate. It's not "fooled" by variations in subject/scene tonalities, the way reflective metering is. Basically, using incident metering there's no need for user intervention with Exposure Compensation to "correct for errors" that are inherent to and unavoidable with reflective metering.

Hand held metering is slower, though. So it's not always practical or possible to use it.

wdross Loc: Castle Rock, Colorado

With some cameras, the focus and exposure can sometimes be set separately from each other. Most of the time the exposure and focus are in the same spot. I am such that is what they were talking about.

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How can I tell if my camera has a meter ?



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PeterBergh

I believe that all 35-mm SLRs made later than around 1970 have meters. Some medium-format film cameras had meters. All digital cameras have meters. Thus, the odds are overwhelming that your camera has a meter. If in doubt, read the manual for the camera.

LoneRangeFinder Loc: Left field

Since I can review the exposure before clicking the shutter, I check and then adjust EC as needed. I also shoot jpeg+raw and sometimes use the in-camera raw processor.

waegwan Loc: Mae Won Li

Notorious T.O.D. Loc: Harrisburg, North Carolina

I always find it interesting how many photographers don't seem to grasp that exposure compensation by definition has to change the shutter speed or aperture that they are shooting at.

drmike99 Loc: Fairfield Connecticut

My first serious camera was my Nikon F Photomic FTN and one of its features was center-weighted metering. That's what I learned on and that's my default for my DSLR also. Inconsistently, for my 3 medium format 120 film cameras I primarily use a hand-held Minolta Spot Meter, or occasionally a Sekonic Incident meter.

waegwan Loc: Mae Won Li

Yup! For about 20 years I used a old Yashica TLR and seldom carried a light meter. I mostly used sunny 16 rule. It was easy to remember and follow as it came either printed on the film box or on a piece of paper packed with the film. :b Anyway by merely adjusting proportionally from sunny 16 I consistently got properly exposed film.

saikatsen Loc: Kolkata, India

Mostly spot metering with -1 to -1.7 EV compensation

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

I don't know the controls of either of your cameras. But, yes the camera has to be set to one of the 3 or 4 metering methods it has, but when the camera is set to Manual Exposure since you are manually setting the Av & Tv (or A & S) you just ignore the camera's meter and set your exposure according to your hand held meter of choice (I have a Minolta Spotmeter F and a Gossen Luna-Six). Meaning you do not use the camera's meter for your exposure setting. I think some of you are over thinking this. Or you have cameras that do not have a truly Full Manual Exposure mode (is there such a beast?).

Pablo8 Loc: Nottingham UK.

If I use the hand-held meter, I transfer the readings to my Nikons, using the manual controls (Shutter & Aperture settings) ,making sure the ISO is the same in the camera, as on the HH meter. The in-the-Nikon viewfinder scale, will show difference (if any) between HH meter and camera TTL reading. 'Belt & Braces', stems from 5 x 4 cameras using film.