Originally posted by someasiancameraguy I typically shoot my film at box ISO and don't touch the exposure compensation dial, opting to trust my camera. But recently I've heard from some that it's actually typically better to overexpose negatives by half to one stop. Is this good practice and why or why not?
There's no quick answer to this question. In part it depends on the film you are using. You don't say if you are talking colour or b&w? If colour negative, then yes, it is recommended to overexpose by about 1 stop to improve colours. There are some excellent videos on YouTube that demonstrate this and explain it better than I can. The exception to this is Kodak Ektar 100 which must be carefully exposed at box speed otherwise it will blow out highlights (I know this from experience
). Other colour negative films are much more forgiving.
As for black and white, which is what I mostly shoot, again it depends on the film, the developer used (big factor! not to be ignored), and your personal taste. I tend to prefer negs with more punch and guts, so set my film speed to overexpose by 1/2 to 1 stop and then develop normally as if for box speed (i.e. longer dev time than recommended for my chosen speed = higher contrast). If I wanted softer contrast I would reduce my dev time by about 10% or so.
Traditional grain films (e.g. Tri-x, HP5, FP4) tend to be more forgiving and have greater exposure latitude, so this works well for them. But tabular grain films (Delta, Tmax) are a bit more fussy about exposure and are more prone to blown highlights if you're not careful -- the most I would rate these is 1/2 stop slower (overexposed) and be very careful with my metering. All of this is also very much influenced by choice of developer, and then development time and agitation regime. Bottom line -- there are a lot of variables at play here.
I recommend just experimenting to see what you like or don't like (taking lots of notes!). That's the fun part of this hobby. A good start is to pick up two rolls of, say, Tri-x or HP5 (both very forgiving films), shoot one at box speed and the other at 1 stop slower (overexposed), picking a few of the same subjects on each roll so you can compare, then develop both rolls in the same tank at the time recommended for box speed, then see which you prefer. FYI -- doing both in the same tank eliminates agitation and developer variables.
So you see....no easy answer
. But I hope this helped a bit.
Cheers,
Svend