Metering for macro and wide angle

I haven't seen this discussed recently.

I am transitioning from film to digital underwater photography and am not sure about the type of light metering for exposure. I seems like many of the digital photographers guestimate their settings on full manual camera and strobe settings then adjust according depening upon the results after the picture is taken.

However, for TTL and wide angle, I would like to know what type of metering is used for those using more automatic settings (and this may help when using the histogram or highlight/shadow info).

Do most use center weighted for macro (like I used to do mostly for film)? Do you also use center weighted for wide angle or is matrix better?

Also, for automatic settings, do some use shutter priority or aperture priority (or are there situation with which one works better than another?)?

Mark

Hi Mark,

I shoot almost entirely manual on the camera and strobes and use spot metering to be able to dial in the exposure I want. The only time I would use an aperture or shutter priority is with big fast moving animals with no strobes like dolphins or whale sharks, with uneven light like early or late in the day when the action is very fast.

The biggest issue we see when moving from film to digital is the tendency to underexpose the digital. The old rule of thumb with film was to underexpose by half a stop to get nice blues. If we do that with a digital sensor we are throwing away up to half the possible tonal values. We want to expose to the right of the histogram to take advantage of the digital sensor and the way the light is captured.

I shot film for many years and fought the change to digital before finally succumbing in 2009. I had an issue with a button on my housing that was partially pressed on a dive last month that didn't allow me to see the screen after I took a shot. The camera was working and making images I just couldn't see the pic on the display. I reverted to the way we used to shoot film and bracketed strobe power, aperture, strobe position, etc. for the dive and mostly got crap. It really brought home to me how much easier and ultimately more fun digital photography is.

Hope that helps a little, have fun with the new rig.

Cheers,

Steve