A photography light meter ensures well exposed pictures.
A photography light meter reads the amount of light in a scene, making it possible to set the correct exposure. While film photographers often used to rely on the additional accuracy of handheld light meters to avoid wasting film with badly exposed shots, this is not necessary in digital photography. With instant image previews available on digital cameras, should an image look poorly exposed, the photographer can easily delete it and take it again. The inbuilt light meters in digital cameras are pretty accurate, and they feature three metering modes which are suited to different lighting conditions.
Instructions
1. Point your digital camera toward the subject so that the inbuilt light meter can take a reading. Look at the reading, which will be visible either through the viewfinder or on your camera's LCD screen.
2. Use the aperture and shutter speed controls to set the correct exposure. A photography light meter will give a negative reading when the picture is underexposed, will give a positive one when it is too bright, and will show "0" when the exposure value is just right.
3. Set the metering mode to matrix when there is an even distribution of light over your subject, or when you do not have long to capture it, such as when shooting wildlife. In this mode, the photography light meter takes a reading from all areas of a scene, averaging them out to come up with a broadly accurate recommended exposure.
4. Choose the "center-weighted" metering mode when you need a greater degree of accuracy. On this setting, the light meter bases its reading mainly on the central area of the frame. It is useful where there is high contrast between the background lighting and foreground areas, as in some portrait shots.
5. Select "spot metering" when you wish to be sure of a correct exposure for a tiny part of the frame only. This mode measures the light from a small spot in the middle of the frame. It is ideal for lots of creative shots and certain portraits, where the light falls unevenly across the subject's face.
Tags: light meter, photography light meter, correct exposure, digital cameras, inbuilt light, light meters