Re: winter landscape in IR

[Ben Kreunen <ben@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 10:37 AM 11/7/99 +0100, you wrote:
>Hi all,
>Soon the winter will knock at the door and I plan to make a fresh serie
>of IR pics. Normally I use HIE at 1/125 sec @ F11 for open sunny
>landscapes and I develop in XTOL 1+1 at 68F (20 C) for 8 1/2 minutes. I
>meter through the lens with the #25 red filter on it. Set the meter at
>600ASA.
>Could you please advice me how to expose winter landscapes. Should I
>give 2 stops more as in normal b/w photography? Thank you!


We don't get that much snow down here, but here goes...

I'll assume that the "give 2 stops more" is a generalisation that you are 
shooting a scene that contains mostly snow (white) and works because your 
camera's light meter averages it's reading to grey. However it will only 
work if 1) most of your scene contains a lot of snow and 2) that snow is 
not in shade (white in shade = grey).

Your problem is one of metering technique rather than one anything changing 
in winter. The film's speed does not change with the seasons Some people do 
change the rating of their IR films with the seasons but I suspect this is 
to control their highlight detail even though this should really be done by 
changing the processing. Exposure should be used to control shadow detail 
(technically, this is what film speed is measured from)... but I digress... 
getting back to your problem...

The whole problem is that it depends on what you are metering. Another 
generalisation which may be more reliable is that the palm of your hand 
will give you a reading one stop under the correct exposure. This is based 
on a caucasian hand and will still vary between people but once you work 
out what shade your palm is it's a very useful check and is easier to carry 
than a grey card.

Other than that I usually try and meter something in the scene that is not 
covered in snow to get my exposure and then the brightest piece of snow to 
check the contrast range....  or just the brightest piece of snow and then 
add 3 stops.  The main thing is that you work out something that works for 
you... no matter how much advise you will get there will always be 
variables that are specific to you, your camera and your processing so be 
prepared to experiment.

Cheers

Ben

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Gallery and Photography Tips (including IR)
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