B+W "K" CPL ... how to properly use this filter?

What do you guys normally do for metering when you use this filter?

I noticed a lot of mine were coming out a bit overblown if I used "spot" metering on either the rock formations at Zion Natl Park the clouds would be overblown (blinkies)... or the rocks were a bit darker while metering on the white clouds. I ended up having to do a whole lot of bracketing in AV mode while attempting to get a good all round exposure.

Any tips would be appreciated in how to use this filter.

I've always just metered as normal (mid-tone) with at times adding +1/2 stop compensation. Bracketing in Landscape work is quite the norm and I too rely a lot on the cameras Histogram. If the scene is out of the Dynamic Range of the camera you can combine bracketed photos in your post processing or work on lightening the shadows while retaining the highlight detail.

merging two shots is PS, like double processing from a single original, is a great way to get the sky from one shot and the ground from another.

spotz04 wrote in post #10814437
What do you guys normally do for metering when you use this filter?

I noticed a lot of mine were coming out a bit overblown if I used "spot" metering on either the rock formations at Zion Natl Park the clouds would be overblown (blinkies)... or the rocks were a bit darker while metering on the white clouds. I ended up having to do a whole lot of bracketing in AV mode while attempting to get a good all round exposure.

Any tips would be appreciated in how to use this filter.

What you describe is simply trouble balancing exposure throughout the scene and has nothing to do with the filter.

Many landscape shooters will use a graduated neutral density filter so you can darken only the sky.

Learn to meter scenes correctly, and the filter makes no difference at all to that technique.

Keep in mind the fundamental principle...All meters try to take the area visualized by the sensor and give you an exposore to make it 18% tonality, regardless if that area is black or white or any tonality in between, the end result is 18%. The use of EC simply allows YOU to 'correct the meter', so that you give a white object more exposure than what is metered, so it ends up white, not 18% gray.

That all makes a lot of sense. This was my first time using a CPL so I thought possibly how much I rotated the filter made a huge difference in exposure but apparently that's not the case. Good to know.

Thanks!

spotz04 wrote in post #10823442
That all makes a lot of sense. This was my first time using a CPL so I thought possibly how much I rotated the filter made a huge difference in exposure but apparently that's not the case. Good to know.

Thanks!

It can make a difference, but not a large difference except in extreme cases. For example, if you have a flat panel computer monitor, try taking a picture of your screen with the polarizer rotated different ways.