Help me to shoot slide film

AshleyC

AshleyC

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ok i just tried my first go a shooting some slide film, fuji velvia 50 5x4. I did 4 shots in all and they all came out under exposed. I did read that with slide film you have to preserve hightlights or its just blown and lost so easily. So for this shot i metered off the brightest part of the petals and used that but the shadow areas are totally lost. This is the best of the 4 shots



So just how do you meter it, it seems to have a very very narrow dynamic range, i wasnt expecting the dark areas of the flowers to be lost like that at all. Im guessing i should of metered it off the petals but then pushed it 1 or 2 stops more? But would that of blown the highlights out?
 
I shoot slide film and have to say its all about light. I don't use it indoors only outdoors.

I think the pic looks good, the colours look nice.
 
I find with Velvia that I miss a lot more shots as a result of underexposure rather than overexposure (I can recover highlights to an extent in Lightroom if needs be but if there is no shadow detail it's ruined) so try and take an incident meter reading with the meter set to ISO 40 of whatever I want to be properly exposed. So for example in this shot I just held the meter in front of the camera pointing towards it (so in the shade rather than the sun) and went with the reading that it provided.


Tryfan from Llyn Idwal by osh rees, on Flickr

Hope that helps.
 
essexash said:
ok i just tried my first go a shooting some slide film, fuji velvia 50 5x4. I did 4 shots in all and they all came out under exposed. I did read that with slide film you have to preserve hightlights or its just blown and lost so easily. So for this shot i metered off the brightest part of the petals and used that but the shadow areas are totally lost. This is the best of the 4 shots



So just how do you meter it, it seems to have a very very narrow dynamic range, i wasnt expecting the dark areas of the flowers to be lost like that at all. Im guessing i should of metered it off the petals but then pushed it 1 or 2 stops more? But would that of blown the highlights out?
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What are you using to meter? A spot meter? Incident meter?

Remember that you probably have five or six stops of dynamic range with most slide films. If you set your exposure for your highlights, which means placing your highlights in zone 5 (i.e., middle grey), your midtones would then be in zones 2 or 3 and your shadows would drop completely outside the film's dynamic range. I would probably meter for the most important highlights in my image, if using a spot meter, and then subtract two stops so that the highlights would then be in zone 7.

When using a handheld meter, you would usually stick the meter in the same light as the subject, point it toward the camera, and take a reading. This would place the midtones in zone 5 and job done. This usually works well for most conditions, especially when it's overcast. The only problem with this method is when the subject brightness range (SBR) exceeds the dynamic range of the film (e.g., a person under a tree on a blazingly bright day). To determine the SBR, I would take a meter reading in both the sun and the shade to see how many stops difference there are. If the difference is more than a few stops, you'll need to find a way to balance the exposures (e.g., fill flash), decide what parts of the scene are most important, or use a film with greater dynamic range.
 
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thanks for the replies peeps :) i was using a spot meter and taking a reading from the petals on the right hand side of the middle flower which seemed the brightest. I just took the reading as is and shot with that. I think all the stories of delicate highlights on slide film put me off pushing it. On normal film id take a reading from the shadows and subtract a stop and a bit to put them where id like.

Ive never tried an incident reading with landscapes, but i like the idea of setting the meter a little lower than the iso.

I'll try a couple more shots over the weekend to see if i can improve things. I think im just amazed at the really narrow range that slide film seems to have! i'll have to bear that in mind.
 
essexash said:
thanks for the replies peeps :) i was using a spot meter and taking a reading from the petals on the right hand side of the middle flower which seemed the brightest.
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If you're using a spot meter, then take a reading from the brightest area that you want detail and then the darkest area that you want detail. If they are within five stops of each other, then you can use an exposure between the two of these and retain detail in both the highlights and shadows.

For instance, if the highlights require f/11 and 1/500 and the shadows f/2.8 and 1/500 (brightness range of four stops), an exposure of f/5.6 and 1/500 would capture the required detail in the brightest and darkest regions whilst remaining within the dynamic range of the film. If you used exposed for the highlights at f/11 and 1/500, as you said that you did with the petals, the shadows in my example would fall outside of the film's dynamic range as they would be four stops below the actual exposure.

EDIT: My suggestions above are based on my experiences shooting Provia. @abbandon suggests below that Velvia 50 has a dynamic range of three and a half stops, so my example with the four stop range wouldn't quite work for that film, but the same principles should apply.
 
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Why Velvia 50 ? I know it is considered the "classic" slide film but it does have some severe limitations the most noticable of which is a commonly agreed range of about three and a half stops and like all slide films trying to apply the zone system is very unlikely to be successfull, also its reciprocityl characteristics are dire your shot is clearly inside presumably under artificail lighting ?

Velvia 100 or Provia 100f will given a decent scanner give you six stops and up to a minuite you are not even going to have to adjust the exposure times or mess about with cc filters.

Quite a good guideline for shooting landscapes is meter a nice white fluffy cloud if there is one then increase your exposure by one and a half stops if you have a true white surface to meter from make that two stops and if you can pick something you regard as a mid tone just go with that for the exposure value. The insides of your flower heads is pretty dense that really is going to eat light with your shot the best bet might have been to merter off a gray card and arrange to have no shadows if you can. Scaring the crap out of flowers with large amounts of flash works too.

Token Velvia 50 shot

8087592494_0810c1bf41_c.jpg


I'm not a fan of it but this was all I could get my mits on at the time metering method as described meter from cloud then compare that against the greyish stone work of the house.
 
why? because it is considered so good. Ive never shot slide film and fancied giving it a go.
 
essexash said:
why? because it is considered so good. Ive never shot slide film and fancied giving it a go.
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And it is bloomin good mate bravo for going for it, my limited opinion is looking at your subject not enough light and the black its doing the classic slide film thing that blacks are bloomin black :)

Personally tho I would agree that for me at least 100 is much better.
 
well ive taken it all on board and will adjust things accordingly. Ive still got 36 sheets of 50 to get through first though before trying something else. The colours do look incredible though and can only be improved on with proper exposure :) Just seeing the negs is good enough reason to keep shooting slide, little stained glass windows :)
 
essexash said:
well ive taken it all on board and will adjust things accordingly. Ive still got 36 sheets of 50 to get through first though before trying something else. The colours do look incredible though and can only be improved on with proper exposure :) Just seeing the negs is good enough reason to keep shooting slide, little stained glass windows :)
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That is so why i love them, all slide film is just like mini pictures.
I have some MF Slide 100 to be scanned from my test roll from my pentax 645n they look lovely on my minisun :)
 
You should see the beauty that is a medium format transparency projected. Would blow your mind.
 
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