I read in many places that Polaroid films are useful for checking the exposure. From what I understand the latitude of the b&w Polaroid is much wider then a Chrome such as Fuji Velvia. How do you base your exposure if the tonality range the Polaroid can catch is much bigger then the slide?

-- Danny Levy (dannyael@zahav.net.il), September 20, 2001

Answers

As with most things photographic you just have to learn to read the polaroid and know how to judge compared to chromes. for exmple I generally shoot polaroids so the highlights are blow'n out then I generally get a pretty good chrome running the film normally. However I still just run the top sheet only so I can judge that and know how to run the rest of the film. Some times I have found polaroid as much as a stop and a half off from batch to batch. So be carefull paying to much attention to polaroids. they are great for composition (minus the border) and good for generall exposure, but don't use them as the end all be all of your film. If nothing else, if your returning from a job some where and the polaroid looks good you can bet you'll get a good chrome and that can be pretty comforting.

doug

-- doug (doug@ajenda.com), September 20, 2001.

Yeah, you have to get used to what should look "right"....we run our own E6, and use type 55 to proof our 4x5 CTs. Generally, we aim to get a good exposure in the highlights, just like shooting chrome. You can "candle" the print by holding it up to a lightsource, to see detail in the shadow areas. The positive part of type 55--the print--has a short contrast range, so it's a good match for chrome films. We don't shoot much velvia, but Provia 100 is our main film, followed by 64T, and EPN. It's a good match for 4x5 TMX 100 as well. the way we do it, if we get a good polaroid, the chrome will be good, and the b&w will be flat almost.....Type 54, or whatever the 100 speed coaterless is called, is a good match too. Type 55 is great for checking focus as well...

-- DK Thompson (kthompson@moh.dcr.state.nc.us), September 20, 2001.