You often average the readings when a mid-tone is not obvious or is absent or
to
weight an exposure. You can take a reading of a highlight and another of a
shadow
area if what you want is something in between but is absent from the scene.
I particularly use multispot readings for portraits or people shots. In the
photo
gallery is a shot I took of my son of him wearing a red top with a red door as
a
background. If I recall correctly I was a bit unsure of whether the red would
be
a suitable mid tone so I took a spot reading of his face and one of his dark
blue
trousers and ended up with detail in both. This takes mere seconds to
accomplish
and you don't have to touch the compensation dial. This shot was on Velvia.
I did a wedding once and found the multispot averaging useful given the
extremes of
the brides dress and the grooms dark jacket. A spot reading off each and one
of the
bouquet for luck seemed to do the trick.
I use multispot metering to weight an exposure the way I want and almost never
touch
the exposure compensation dial. I might take a reading of a highlight and two
readings off a shadow area to lighten an exposure. Sometimes I might take two
readings of an obvious mid tone and one reading of a highlight or shadow to
weight
the exposure either one way or the other.
This may sound long winded but in practice it takes seconds. You are not
letting go
of the decision making process, quite the opposite. What you choose to meter,
or
how many times, takes thought and can be just as purposeful as twiddling the
exposure compensation dial.
Giles
Simon E. wrote:
> okay, I see it in operation. However, I am struggling with *why* you would
> average these readings. Perhaps it works better than I anticipate, but I
> would have thought that you are letting go of the decision-making process
> when setting the exposure, which seems odd if you're already taking the time
> to set a number spot meter readings for different parts of the scene. What
> if you want the important tones to be other than midtone? you're surely
> going to have to dial in some compensation, if you stay in auto? If you
> know what your midtone is, why not meter off it just *once* and use that?
> Confused.
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