Messing Around With Metering

The metering in your DSLR is what gives the computer in the camera the information it wants to compute the most acceptable exposure settings; shutter speed and aperture. The selections among the metering modes tell the computer what parts of the incoming image data to use or how much to use in that calculation.

 

I'll be using descriptions from the manual for my Canon EOS 5D Mk2 and images taken with that camera which is my favorite camera.

First here's the description section from the 5D's manual page about metering modes.

Your camera may use different nomenclature so you can see which description matches which name for your camera.

What may intrigue you as it did me is how those different metering modes actually change a picture. For most of your pictures the answer is "Not much." Here's a set of four photographs I took of the same scene with my camera set in the P mode which is the Program mode that all the DSLRs have that will set the exposure as you push the shutter button half way but gives you the option of changing a setting. I let the camera do the work.

What jumps out at me about this set is that the silk flowers near the camera are the brightest in the photo made with the evaluative metering. I would expect the flowers to be brightest when spot metering was used on the flowers.

Another way to get the metering right for something like these flowers in a photo that includes a lot of the brighter background is to point the camera at the darker area and get your settings the automatic way and then use the AE (auto exposure) locking feature before you recompose the shot.

Your owner's manual will tell you how to do that with your camera.