From the course: Photography Foundations: Exposure (part 1)
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How light meters work
From the course: Photography Foundations: Exposure (part 1)
How light meters work
- Here's a weird one. Look at this black and white checkerboard. We've got equal numbers of black and white squares, and all of the squares are the same size. Obviously, white squares reflect light and black squares don't. So, you might think that this grid, which is half composed of reflective white squares would reflect half of the light that strikes it, but it doesn't, it only reflects 18% of the light that strikes it. Here's a weirder one. This is true for most scenes in the world, it turns out that most scenes that you look at reflect around 18% of the light that strikes them. Now this fact has obvious applications for cocktail party conversation, and crossword puzzles, and making very nerdy impressions of first dates. But there is a photographic application as well, because most scenes in the world reflect 18% of the light that strikes them, if your light meter assumes that what it's pointed at is reflecting 18%, then that's a pretty safe assumption. Here's why that's useful…
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