Karthik Ganesh

Basically the incident meter as the name suggests, just takes into account the light incident on the subject, and it doesnt take into account the reflectivity of the subject. For eg, for the same source, - Black, or Mid-Gray, or White everything will give the same reading. While the spot meter will take into account the reflectivity of the material into account and give u a reading, by which if u expose, you will get mid gray. As in, if u meter and expose white or mid gray or black with the help of a spot meter, u will get mid gray in all the 3 instances. If u use a spot meter on a gray card, that will match the incident meter reading for the same scene...hope i am clear... A clarification, regarding this... "saw a lighting demo by Christian Sebalt ASC once and he said that he never uses his incident meter. He prefers to be by the camera so that he can evaluate the scene as a whole and fire off spot meter readings from there" I have used a contrast filter, determined roughly my mid gray in the frame, took reading from spot meter and exposed, it was fine. Can u please comment. I will definitely try more number of times, but pl do share ur thoughts. Thank you. - Karthik Ganesh