There is no greater educator in photography than Steve. Deep understanding with an ability to explain simply is a gift. Keep up the awesome work please Steve.
I really had to laugh, I just got back from an all-day shooting at a castle with lots of lights and darks. When I got home I was so upset that the pictures did not turn out the way I wanted. You just explained every scenario that I faced and what I had done wrong!!! YOU HAVE MY ATTENTION!!! And just to prove the commitment I bought all your ebooks and will get involved with your group. I am a Nikon shooter D5600 and been at it for about two years. Most things I have had good success with but this last go-round was a disaster! I shoot in Raw and JPEG so I did manage to fix some of it in post. I am much better in post than I am in photography. Thank you much for your videos and help, you are very well respected in the photographic industry. I need to get on your star and figure out all I can!!! Thank you, Steve Moonpie
Love your content Steve. TH-cam photography seems to be getting more and more click bait. Your channel is the exception. You've taught me a lot and I appreciate the hard work you put in. Thank you.
Between you and Chas Goatzer videos I have learned so much more than the attended workshops with " professional photographers". Thank you so much, the frustration just melts away as the " ah-ha" clicks in.
Love this channel it’s been helping me a lot since my mentor passed away a few years ago . He got me started in photography. Today I will try portraits since I usually do birds . Rip William P Bergen
This video opened my eyes on how important it is to spot meter before you take a shot. It helps achive best colors and contrast correctly. I think this is one of the main reasons my images were always off and I wasnt happy with colors and contrast. Grey card or an expodisc is a must have to get perfect exposure and colors.
Many photographers especially those new to photography don't realise that the cameras meter is trying to make images middle grey, herein lies the problem! Underexposing when shooting a white subject gives huge amounts of noise if you think you can just up the exposure in processing !!! Great video Steve! Cheers
And the problem is that it's counter-intuitive too. When people are faced with a bright lighter-than-middle-tone scene (like a snow scene), they think they need less exposure because it's so bright. So, they're often REALLY confused when it's 2 stops under!
@@backcountrygallery Aah the thing is I've been a photographer for over 30 years and I have the hindsight of reading your books which explain so many aspects of photography wonderfully well! Cheers and thanks for the response Steve.
Hi Steve, so glad you are telling people about this, especially about placing the meter in the right place in manual mode rather than just in the middle as most other videos do! A quick tip for your followers to get their eye in for estimating tone value is to put it in manual mode, point at a known value area ( grass at midtone) move settings until the meter is in the middle THEN move the camera to different areas & watch the meter. The meter will tell you the tone value of the new area.👍
I can't thank you enough Steve, never has any tutorial been so clear. I just bought two of your books to better understand my D850 as I venture into wedding photography. Thank you, thank you, thank you
Thanks Steve. Your videos are my "go to" for concise, accurate, and entertaining information. I bought all of your ebooks which are awesome and filled with great content. Thank you for sharing your talents! p.s. - and yes I was one of the photographers that didn't give metering too much thought...sadly.
Most of the time, I use the A mode and matrix metering on my D750 (and compensate if needed), but in more difficult situations I switch to the manual mode and spot metering. And now, after watching your video, I checked that my palm gives exactly the same reading as the middle grey square on the Xrite Colorchecker (the one under the yellow square). :) Thank you a million!!!
This was a great education on tricking the meter. you are correct Steve, many people depend on the camera and know nothing about tricking or overriding the meter. Thanks for your time and work. Best teacher out there.
Thanks, Steve! Most of my progress the past two years can be attributed to your books and videos. No other single source has contributed so much to my knowledge base.
Cheers Steve, being a motorsports photographer, I find spot metering to come in handy at times, but also messes up a shot when the subject is either white or black. I will try locking the metering on a "grey" area next time. My function button is set to spot metering on both cameras (D4 / D4s) , its nice to see someone else using that shortcut.
Brilliant Steve , every video of your is an educational content. Full of information.Totally absorbing and with clarity I come out with every video. Thank you again.👍
I have been practicing Photography for 5 years now. In as many instructions or tutorials I have had this is by fat the best Spot metering tutorial I have. Explained very nicely. Thank you Steve
I had to replay the section where you cropped the target area from the three photos to convince myself you had not just pulled a trick on us. The targets look very different from each other in the original photos, but i guess that's just an optical illusion. That was a great demonstration!
I actually thought about just putting the pics side by side, but like you say, optically it doesn't look like they are the same. I was even questing it myself when looking at the pics!! That's why I popped them and did it the way I did :)
@@backcountrygallery yeah i figured you went thru that process. I would have liked to see both approaches, but certainly understand and respect your editorial choices. Can't include everything!
Love this video! Great work! that so well explains why when I spot meter a dark object, its overexposed AND you told me how to fix this. thank you so much Steve! Great video!!!...Bob
First video from Steve I have watched in a while (have not been feeling really creative) - FIRST TIME you have not cost me money by showing me something I just cannot live without! Thanks for all you do for the photography community - please keep it up!
Very good. Just about everyone does not know what the meter does. I first learned about metering from studying books about Ansel Adams. He used a spot meter and meters off middle gray. When I started, the general rule was to meter off grass in the same light as your subject.
Excellent piece of teaching Steeve! The video explains the content right to the points without making too much unwanted lecturers as often seen in other you tube videos. Thank you so very much for the wonderful presentation...
Steven this was just the best piece on metering. Also I think by you shooting multiple camera brands now you have opened up a whole new area of field tested comparison content which would be so helpful as well to those selecting gear. Much appreciated and thank you.
This was really good STEVE! Some things I’ve realized all along but never used, some new things that I will use, and all-around good information that I need to know. Then shooting for many years I just thought spot metering was spot metering, LOL
Wow Steve!! Man you never cease to amaze me with how you explain things. I have actually been experimenting with my metering modes over the last 2 weeks and was still unsure how it worked. Thanks so much for the clarification.
very good lesson even for an experienced photographers to remind all about spot metering . I use Pentax K20 with prism not mirrors viewfinder system so Pentax spot metering is same like professional hand light meter . it is good to have support classic hend light matter
Very good explanation. In the film days I used spot metering and interpreted the reading and compensated my settings according to subject reflectance. It was accurate once I learn how much compensation to give the item I took the reading off. Like so many things photographic experience goes a long way. What is important is to recognize when we make a mistake and what we need to do so we don't repeat the mistake.
Thank you Steve for another helpful video (now it comes to practice 😄). I had attempted some bird in flight action shots, used aperture priority and just under F11 and found that even the focus box was on the bird properly it was not in focus and I had a bad sleep about it, searching for bigger better more expensive lenses right after that but the 55-300mm lens takes nice stills and portraits otherwise so I backed off on getting another mortgage for a massive stargazer type lens ;) and went searching for the Steve Perry channel to help me out of my misery thoughts. I missed out on remembering the great ISO video available and hence with the camera not getting to it's proper shutter speed it produced what I deserved with my first bird action shooting session so ... I will revisit that and make sure that the rest of the camera's action shooting settings are activated as well. Thanks again for your great helpful videos, really enjoy the teachings.
Good video that got me thinking. My Canon R5 seems to a lot of the exposure work for me. There are average , partial and spot modes. All three seem to combined in evaluative (as are the icons). Evaluative does change exposure as the focus area moves, so it seems to be compensating as you go. You can of course override the compensation easily.
Hi Steve, good content I enjoy your videos. This is something I've known for 30 years because I took pictures before spot metering existed when you actually had to know what exposure meant and before post processing could save you. In fact, Birds As Art photographer Arthur Morris created a pocket guide showing how to adjust exposure base on various scenes.
This is just what I needed..very informative! And just what I need as I am photographing some black and white rabbits in a low light room 😁I will be trying all your tips ..thank you Steve 😎
Again Steve, thank you for explaining in such details. So easy to follow you. I understand far more now and itching to try this. I will practise for sure.
One of the challenges that I face is to deal with contrasty birds in strong sun, their tonal range. There's a surprising number of pied species in my country and avoiding blowing out the whites is essential. My rule of thumb is +2 EV on the D500 and +1.5 on the A1 but often that has to be increased. Then of course what you can do in post with the tone curve will make or break the image, trying to get plumage texture in both the whites and the blacks.
Thanks for this easy understanding of of potentially difficult to understand subject It shows the great advantage of cameras using an EVF have, by being able to see and correct the exposure issues before taking the shot
Steve, with your complexion (not too pale white), spot meter your skin and compare with your grey card. Also spot meter the inside of your hand. If you want to use the TTL spot meter as a surrogate lightmeter then this works very well.
yes, this is absolutely incredible, thank you so much p.s. my goal was to try and make my onboard meter follow my focus point, but I learned so much more that I didn't even know I needed to learn
thanks , explained well today when i used the spot metering on a landscape the background sun got over exposed almost to white, but matrix got it right .
The Fuji systems (newer X-series and GFX cameras), when set to face-detect, always use the spot-metering of the skin tone as the middle grey… exposure compensation from that point solves any issues… so face-detect on Fuji, is like instant-spot-metering, while any other subject will respect the metering mode you’ve selected.
The garden is the dojo for learning how my camera functions before i take it to the streets!
That was the BEST spot metering tutorial I have ever seen. Outstanding!!
The demonstration finally made it click for me as to how spot metering works! Thanks for this informative video!
This has to be the easiest way to understand metering. Perfect video.
There is no greater educator in photography than Steve. Deep understanding with an ability to explain simply is a gift. Keep up the awesome work please Steve.
I really had to laugh, I just got back from an all-day shooting at a castle with lots of lights and darks. When I got home I was so upset that the pictures did not turn out the way I wanted. You just explained every scenario that I faced and what I had done wrong!!! YOU HAVE MY ATTENTION!!! And just to prove the commitment I bought all your ebooks and will get involved with your group. I am a Nikon shooter D5600 and been at it for about two years. Most things I have had good success with but this last go-round was a disaster! I shoot in Raw and JPEG so I did manage to fix some of it in post. I am much better in post than I am in photography. Thank you much for your videos and help, you are very well respected in the photographic industry. I need to get on your star and figure out all I can!!!
Thank you, Steve
Moonpie
Love your content Steve. TH-cam photography seems to be getting more and more click bait. Your channel is the exception.
You've taught me a lot and I appreciate the hard work you put in. Thank you.
And also more and more about comparing equipment. I have unsubscribed from more than one "photography" channel as a result of all the gear obsessing.
Between you and Chas Goatzer videos I have learned so much more than the attended workshops with " professional photographers". Thank you so much, the frustration just melts away as the " ah-ha" clicks in.
Love this channel it’s been helping me a lot since my mentor passed away a few years ago . He got me started in photography. Today I will try portraits since I usually do birds . Rip William P Bergen
This was a very very good video. There was no other video on youtube that could explain it so well
I'm so glad I found your videos. I'm about 6 months in with my first ever camera, and have learned very much from you already, Thank you!!!
Good instruction. When I did film photography I used spot metering almost exclusively. I rarely use it with digital but your content was right on.
Yes. Outstanding. Ive used it (with Zone Metering) for decades and always struggled to explain it simply. This totally nails it.
This video opened my eyes on how important it is to spot meter before you take a shot. It helps achive best colors and contrast correctly.
I think this is one of the main reasons my images were always off and I wasnt happy with colors and contrast.
Grey card or an expodisc is a must have to get perfect exposure and colors.
Finally my exposure compensation button on my d750 got some meaning. Very well explained. Thank You.
I totally agree with the last comment. Clear, concise presentation, built on practical knowledge. Thank you!
Many photographers especially those new to photography don't realise that the cameras meter is trying to make images middle grey, herein lies the problem! Underexposing when shooting a white subject gives huge amounts of noise if you think you can just up the exposure in processing !!! Great video Steve! Cheers
And the problem is that it's counter-intuitive too. When people are faced with a bright lighter-than-middle-tone scene (like a snow scene), they think they need less exposure because it's so bright. So, they're often REALLY confused when it's 2 stops under!
@@backcountrygallery Aah the thing is I've been a photographer for over 30 years and I have the hindsight of reading your books which explain so many aspects of photography wonderfully well! Cheers and thanks for the response Steve.
Hi Steve, so glad you are telling people about this, especially about placing the meter in the right place in manual mode rather than just in the middle as most other videos do! A quick tip for your followers to get their eye in for estimating tone value is to put it in manual mode, point at a known value area ( grass at midtone) move settings until the meter is in the middle THEN move the camera to different areas & watch the meter. The meter will tell you the tone value of the new area.👍
I can't thank you enough Steve, never has any tutorial been so clear. I just bought two of your books to better understand my D850 as I venture into wedding photography. Thank you, thank you, thank you
Wow, thank you so much!
Thanks Steve. Your videos are my "go to" for concise, accurate, and entertaining information. I bought all of your ebooks which are awesome and filled with great content. Thank you for sharing your talents!
p.s. - and yes I was one of the photographers that didn't give metering too much thought...sadly.
As usual, the best content and tips of photography! Keep it in that way ! Best regards from Argentina!
Basic knowledge told and shown in the best way i´ve seen so far on the tube! I will link to this for my students and friends. Thanks Steve!
You never cease to amaze me. You make me so damn jealous with your pics. Keep up the great work.
Most of the time, I use the A mode and matrix metering on my D750 (and compensate if needed), but in more difficult situations I switch to the manual mode and spot metering. And now, after watching your video, I checked that my palm gives exactly the same reading as the middle grey square on the Xrite Colorchecker (the one under the yellow square). :) Thank you a million!!!
This was a great education on tricking the meter. you are correct Steve, many people depend on the camera and know nothing about tricking or overriding the meter. Thanks for your time and work. Best teacher out there.
Exceptionally clear and sensible advice - your experience shows in every suggestion
Thanks, Steve! Most of my progress the past two years can be attributed to your books and videos. No other single source has contributed so much to my knowledge base.
Melinda Adams me too. His videos and books are irreplaceable.
This is the million-dollar answer you have given..thx a lot sir
Cheers Steve, being a motorsports photographer, I find spot metering to come in handy at times, but also messes up a shot when the subject is either white or black. I will try locking the metering on a "grey" area next time. My function button is set to spot metering on both cameras (D4 / D4s) , its nice to see someone else using that shortcut.
Brilliant Steve , every video of your is an educational content. Full of information.Totally absorbing and with clarity I come out with every video. Thank you again.👍
Something I rarely think about! But it’s great to get this refresher. Thanks Steve.
This is brilliant so easy to follow and understand and yes I have been thinking wrong on spot metering .. many thanks Steve
Your version of spot metering is the best and much simpler to understand even for a Filipino like me. LOL. I am your new subscriber. Thank you.
I love your video the best, getting into the technical stuffs but explaining it in lay man's terms. Keep up the good work!
Fantastic tutorial, easy to understand for an amateur photographer, thank you.
I have been practicing Photography for 5 years now. In as many instructions or tutorials I have had this is by fat the best Spot metering tutorial I have. Explained very nicely. Thank you Steve
Very clear explanation. Even I understood it straight away. Awesome.
I had to replay the section where you cropped the target area from the three photos to convince myself you had not just pulled a trick on us. The targets look very different from each other in the original photos, but i guess that's just an optical illusion. That was a great demonstration!
I actually thought about just putting the pics side by side, but like you say, optically it doesn't look like they are the same. I was even questing it myself when looking at the pics!! That's why I popped them and did it the way I did :)
@@backcountrygallery yeah i figured you went thru that process. I would have liked to see both approaches, but certainly understand and respect your editorial choices. Can't include everything!
Great video. Years ago, I had a 5x7 field camera and a 1 degree spot meter. Slowing down helped me learn so much.
Love this video! Great work! that so well explains why when I spot meter a dark object, its overexposed AND you told me how to fix this. thank you so much Steve! Great video!!!...Bob
First video from Steve I have watched in a while (have not been feeling really creative) - FIRST TIME you have not cost me money by showing me something I just cannot live without! Thanks for all you do for the photography community - please keep it up!
You are awesome! Such depth of knowledge and so talented at explaining it in simple, relatable terms. Thank you!
Very good. Just about everyone does not know what the meter does. I first learned about metering from studying books about Ansel Adams. He used a spot meter and meters off middle gray. When I started, the general rule was to meter off grass in the same light as your subject.
Once again another great video and I am going to have to review it with camera in hand during daylight (4:00 a.m. now!) Thank you!
Excellent piece of teaching Steeve! The video explains the content right to the points without making
too much unwanted lecturers as often seen in other you tube videos. Thank you so very much for the wonderful presentation...
Wow, this guide is amazing. Found your channel yesterday and this is the first thing that I get today? Yes please
Steven this was just the best piece on metering. Also I think by you shooting multiple camera brands now you have opened up a whole new area of field tested comparison content which would be so helpful as well to those selecting gear. Much appreciated and thank you.
This was really good STEVE! Some things I’ve realized all along but never used, some new things that I will use, and all-around good information that I need to know. Then shooting for many years I just thought spot metering was spot metering, LOL
Just watched this a second time and learned even more. Great video, wish I could like again. 8)
Not a Nikon shooter but this can be applied across the board, very well done, love it.
Wow Steve!! Man you never cease to amaze me with how you explain things. I have actually been experimenting with my metering modes over the last 2 weeks and was still unsure how it worked. Thanks so much for the clarification.
Now I understand what my problem was that my subjects were either over exposed or underexposed! Thanks
Steve, I just went through my d500 menu to play with the AE mode, but I could not find it! Is d500 including that option at all?
very good lesson even for an experienced photographers to remind all about spot metering . I use Pentax K20 with prism not mirrors viewfinder system so Pentax spot metering is same like professional hand light meter . it is good to have support classic hend light matter
You are a great professional writer
great video Steve
Very clear explanation. Extremely pretty photos 🙋🏻♂️
Very good explanation. In the film days I used spot metering and interpreted the reading and compensated my settings according to subject reflectance. It was accurate once I learn how much compensation to give the item I took the reading off. Like so many things photographic experience goes a long way. What is important is to recognize when we make a mistake and what we need to do so we don't repeat the mistake.
Spot on ! Great explanation, clarified a lot of confusion, well done
That was the best explanation I have seen on this subject - thankyou!! :)
Your videos are informative and to the point. I will pick up your Nikon book.
As usual, Steve clears things up! Perfect explanation and clear as always. Thanks for demystifying this!
Thank you Steve for another helpful video (now it comes to practice 😄). I had attempted some bird in flight action shots, used aperture priority and just under F11 and found that even the focus box was on the bird properly it was not in focus and I had a bad sleep about it, searching for bigger better more expensive lenses right after that but the 55-300mm lens takes nice stills and portraits otherwise so I backed off on getting another mortgage for a massive stargazer type lens ;) and went searching for the Steve Perry channel to help me out of my misery thoughts. I missed out on remembering the great ISO video available and hence with the camera not getting to it's proper shutter speed it produced what I deserved with my first bird action shooting session so ... I will revisit that and make sure that the rest of the camera's action shooting settings are activated as well. Thanks again for your great helpful videos, really enjoy the teachings.
You are a gifted teacher! Thank you for all you do! Best explanation for exposure ever
Good video that got me thinking. My Canon R5 seems to a lot of the exposure work for me. There are average , partial and spot modes. All three seem to combined in evaluative (as are the icons). Evaluative does change exposure as the focus area moves, so it seems to be compensating as you go. You can of course override the compensation easily.
Thanks Steve, great explanation of metering using the mid tone examples👌
Thanks Steve... your tutorials are the best around. Straight to the point, detailed and with a brilliant way to explain it all.
Hi Steve, good content I enjoy your videos. This is something I've known for 30 years because I took pictures before spot metering existed when you actually had to know what exposure meant and before post processing could save you. In fact, Birds As Art photographer Arthur Morris created a pocket guide showing how to adjust exposure base on various scenes.
Great tutorial Steve, you managed to give a presentation on the zone system without actually mentioning the zone system.👍🏼
Thanks :) I thought about mentioning it, but I wanted to keep the concepts simple.
Finally i'm getting it
Slowly but surely
im getting it
Thank you
Thank you
Thank you
This was mighty helpful Steve. Could not have been more clear and easy to understand!
This is just what I needed..very informative! And just what I need as I am photographing some black and white rabbits in a low light room 😁I will be trying all your tips ..thank you Steve 😎
Again Steve, thank you for explaining in such details. So easy to follow you. I understand far more now and itching to try this. I will practise for sure.
Always a pleasure to watch your so instructive videos Steve ! Likes and subs 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻
Was watching another camera topic and this popped up... I said hmmm always wondered about spot metering... wow now I know! Thanks - great lesson!
This tip is absolutely a treasure for the photographers. I thank you Steve for explaining the Spot metering so nicely. 🙏
Cheers
One of the challenges that I face is to deal with contrasty birds in strong sun, their tonal range. There's a surprising number of pied species in my country and avoiding blowing out the whites is essential. My rule of thumb is +2 EV on the D500 and +1.5 on the A1 but often that has to be increased. Then of course what you can do in post with the tone curve will make or break the image, trying to get plumage texture in both the whites and the blacks.
Thank you, I made notes thoroughly.
Thank you... Amazing... Easy to understand... best one I watched...
It's already been said, but...best metering video ever
Absolutely love your explanation of finer aspects of spot metering, with great examples. Learnt a lot.
Thanks for this easy understanding of of potentially difficult to understand subject
It shows the great advantage of cameras using an EVF have, by being able to see and correct the exposure issues before taking the shot
Thanks for the info on spot metering. Now I know how it works.
Pardon the pun but your instructions are spot on! Great content, I'm now subscribed!
This is a lovely video, cleared my doubts !
This is such a great tutorial! I TOO, thought I found meting gold!
Best video on this topic. Now I get it. Thank you!
Very informative and well explained. Thank you.
hey Steve here, from journey.... out in the field taking nice bird shots! 👍
Very clearly explained for the beginners
Steve, with your complexion (not too pale white), spot meter your skin and compare with your grey card. Also spot meter the inside of your hand. If you want to use the TTL spot meter as a surrogate lightmeter then this works very well.
I actually have a note in about that at one point in the video :)
Thanks Steve... heard it all before, but it still is a bit confusing in the field.
It takes practice for sure, but it'll come to you.
Love your tutorials, Steve!: clear, informative, and to the point. 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻
Enjoyed your metering video and have always appreciated your book on the subject.
Blinkies can help too of course. As per your video on that feature.
yes, this is absolutely incredible, thank you so much p.s. my goal was to try and make my onboard meter follow my focus point, but I learned so much more that I didn't even know I needed to learn
Very well explained Steve ! Thank you 🙏🏻👍😊
Awesome explanation... Thanks a ton for the video.
thanks , explained well today when i used the spot metering on a landscape the background sun got over exposed almost to white, but matrix got it right .
Excellent, succinct and comprehensive.
The Fuji systems (newer X-series and GFX cameras), when set to face-detect, always use the spot-metering of the skin tone as the middle grey… exposure compensation from that point solves any issues… so face-detect on Fuji, is like instant-spot-metering, while any other subject will respect the metering mode you’ve selected.