To meter or not to meter...

I have only owned a light meter for 3 months of my career. It was a Gossen Luna Pro and I bought it my first year in college. It "walked" away from me soon after I bought it and I never looked back. Polaroid was my light meter from 1971-1997. The image above shows a few of the thousands of Polaroids that I shot during that part of my career. On the left is one year of 8X10 Polaroids that I shot while at Nabisco. I shot $3000.00 per year just in Polaroids. On my last film job I shot 54 8X10 Polaroids before exposing just 6 sheets of film. 

The more often you shot the easier it was to know how to judge exposure from a Polaroid. The trouble happened when an art director loved the softness inherent in a Polaroid and wanted that in a chrome. Thankfully, most creatives never saw the two together. 

Today, Polaroid has left us professionals. There has always been a love-hate relationship between us. We would buy a retro-fitted Polaroid that could connect to our camera and then Polaroid would stop making that film so we would have to buy another back. They were never cheap. But digital has has killed Polaroid. Now we can just shoot and chimp, shoot and chimp. 

So I have spent a little time discussing Polaroid and chimping but have ignored light meters. And I have done that since 1971.

Temporary Retoucher for Bed Bath & Beyond

I captured a 2+ month freelance job as a digital retoucher for Bed Bath & Beyond. As a bonus, my friend Bruce Frazier did as well. We spent most of the time digitally filling empty glasses with drinks. Cut glass proved especially taxing in an attempt to make it believable. I am blessed that my years at Nabisco forced me to adopt digital in the early 90's. While some took more time than others, nothing was beyond my abilities. It ended up being nothing but fun!