Exposure with neg stocks - over by half?

[Matt Wells]

Just some opinion wanted.

 

In terms of exposing the super8 negative stocks, I tend to overexpose by say half a stop minimum, which helps to reduce grain. Sometimes when I have underexposed the results are horrid excessive grain.

 

Does anyone else have any experiences here?

 

Matt

[David Mullen ASC]

Most people overexpose by 1/3 or 2/3 because that's how their light meters work in increments in terms of setting the ASA value; I usually use 2/3 of a stop if I'm really going for a denser negative. A 1/2 stop is good too. Overexposing by 1/3 of a stop is more of an insurance policy against accidentally underexposing a little because on average you may or may not end up with a denser than normal negative due to variations in how you expose.

 

I think anything more than 1 stop is counterproductive because you might as well just use the next speed slower film stock. Remember that overexposing isn't making the stock finer-grained because the large grains are the first ones exposed -- overexposing fills in the gaps between the large grains with smaller, slower grains, making the grain structure "tighter" so it LOOKS less grainy. But if you actually want smaller grains overall, you have to use a slower-speed stock (or a larger negative.)

[Matt Wells]

Thanks for that David

[K Borowski]

Dave, about how many stocks would you say a negative film can take before it becomes unprintable in your experience? Or have you never had the misfortune of incorrectly using a light meter :rolleyes: ? I shot a roll of film a while back that I've been afraid to have developed because segments are normally exposed, but others are overexposed by 3 1/2 stops. I've been thinking of having it pulled one stop, to try and give the overexposed scenes a chance at maybe 2 1/2 stops of overexposure, and I've heard that you can still get decent results with even three stops overexposure.

 

Regards.

~Karl Borowski

[David Mullen ASC]

Anything three stops or over needing to be printed down probably would hit over 50 on one or more of the three printer lights, requiring that you retrim the printer. It would start to look washed-out, pastel, with a loss of detail in the highlights because you had exposed so much of the image on the shoulder of the characteristic curve of the negative.

 

I've never been that wrong in exposing but I once had some second unit footage shot by someone else come back over three stops overexposed. We were able to get something semi-usable in timing the print but it never quite looked right and didn't match the rest of the movie. But later in the home video transfer we were able to match it better.

 

Yes, I'd probably get it pull-processed down a little closer to a normal density, maybe do a one-stop pull and print down the rest of the way.