Chapter 5 — Exercises

Exposure is a doing skill judged by a graph, not a feeling — so most of these exercises put a scope in front of you and ask you to hit a target on purpose. Do them with whatever you have: every one works on a phone with a free manual-camera app, and several need no camera at all. The starred items build directly toward Project 1's clean, repeatable exposure, and the interleaved section at the end weaves in Chapters 2 and 4 so the whole of Part I starts to fuse into one skill.

Work in order the first time through — the sections build — then cherry-pick for practice. Above all, do the shooting ones. You cannot learn exposure by reading about a waveform any more than you can learn to swim by reading about water; you learn it by putting a scope on an image and moving a lever until the trace lands where you wanted.

Exercises are graded by effort and depth:

• ⭐ Warm-up — a few minutes; locks in a concept.
• ⭐⭐ Core — the real practice; do as many as you can.
• ⭐⭐⭐ Stretch — deeper or more ambitious; where the biggest gains are.

Model solutions and critiques for the starred and odd-numbered exercises are collected in Answers to Selected Exercises at the back of the book. Attempt each one before you read its answer — a wrong attempt teaches more than a right answer you only read.

A. Seeing exposure (Eye & Ear Training)

No camera — just your attention and the reflex the whole chapter depends on. These are quick; do them while you're already watching things.

1. ⭐ Find the clip. For the next ten videos you watch, pause on one bright shot in each and ask: is anything blown out? Look for skies, windows, and white shirts that have gone to featureless paper-white with no detail. Note three where the highlights clipped, and for each decide whether it looked intentional (a stylized flare or a deliberately bright, airy look) or like a mistake (information the shot clearly wanted but lost). Learning to tell those two apart is the whole point of "protect the highlights." (Answer provided.)

2. ⭐ Where's the skin? In five different videos with a person in frame, decide by eye whether the face looks bright (sitting high in the tonal range — clean, open, commercial) or dark/moody (sitting low — tense, intimate, hidden). Write the one word for each plus what it served. You're training the judgment a waveform will later make exact. (Answer provided.)

3. ⭐⭐ Spot the auto-exposure breathing. Watch phone or vlog footage until you catch the image visibly brightening or darkening mid-shot as the camera re-exposes — it happens most when the subject moves, the camera pans toward a window, or a cloud passes. Describe one instance precisely (what triggered it, how the brightness ramped) and say exactly what the shooter should have done instead. This "breathing" is one of the loudest amateur tells; once you can see it, you'll never leave auto-exposure on for a locked shot again. (Answer provided.)

4. ⭐⭐ Rate the shadow. Find three shots with deep shadows. For each, decide: does the shadow hold detail (you can just make out texture — a jacket's weave, a wall) or is it crushed to featureless black? Note which choice served the mood and whether it looked deliberate or accidental. This is your eye learning the bottom of the waveform, the same way Exercise 1 trained the top.

B. The locked triangle (Settings Drill)

5. ⭐ Name the pinned lever. In one sentence each, state: which exposure control is pinned in video, what pins it, and why you don't move it to fix brightness. If you can't do this cold, re-read §5.1 before continuing — everything downstream depends on it. (Answer provided.)

6. ⭐⭐ Three ways to lose a stop. Your shot is exactly one stop too bright, ISO is at native, and you're at 24 fps / 1/50 s. Write three different fixes and the side fee of each; then say which you'd choose if the shot's whole point is a soft, out-of-focus background, and defend the choice in one sentence. (Answer provided.)

7. ⭐⭐ The trade-back. You close your aperture from f/2.8 to f/5.6 to get more of a product in focus. (a) How many stops of light did you lose? (b) Name two ways to give that light back without touching the shutter, and the cost of each. (c) Which would you reach for first, and why? (Answer provided.)

8. ⭐⭐ Diagnose the dead end. A shooter outdoors complains: "I want f/2 for the look, my shutter's at 1/50, ISO is already at base — and it's still way overexposed. I'm stuck." They are not stuck. Name the one tool that solves this with no side fee, roughly how much of it a sunny day might need, and why the two "obvious" alternatives (faster shutter, smaller aperture) each ruin the shot. (Answer provided.)

9. ⭐⭐⭐ Write the recipe four ways. For a bright outdoor interview where you want a shallow background, write four different valid exposures that all land at the same brightness — varying which lever does the work (aperture vs ND vs a small ISO change vs the forbidden faster shutter), and note what each version costs the image. Rank them best-to-worst for this shot and defend your ranking in a sentence each. This is the single best exercise for proving you understand that stops are one currency in four wallets. (Model answer provided.)

C. ISO and native ISO (Shoot This + Settings Drill)

10. ⭐ Find your base. Look up (and write down) your camera's native/base ISO — and whether it has a second native ISO (dual native ISO). If you only have a phone, find the lowest ISO your manual app allows and note it. You'll use this number as step 2 of the workflow in every shoot from now on, so put it somewhere you won't lose it. (Answer discusses how to find it.)

11. ⭐⭐ The noise ladder. In a dim room, frame a static shot with some deep shadow in it. Shoot the same framing at your lowest/native ISO, then two stops up, then as high as your camera goes — compensating brightness only with aperture or added light so all three look equally bright. View at 100% and describe precisely where and how the noise appears as ISO climbs (which part of the image first, what it looks like). Keep the clip; the highest ISO you'd actually accept is your personal ceiling. (Model critique provided.)

12. ⭐⭐ Native vs lowest. If your camera has a native ISO above its lowest setting (e.g. native 800, but the dial goes down to 100), shoot a high-contrast scene at both and compare the shadow detail and highlight roll-off. Which held more range? (If your native ISO is the lowest setting, explain in two sentences why this exercise wouldn't show a difference for you — and what that tells you about your sensor.)

13. ⭐⭐⭐ The last-resort test. Stage a genuinely dim scene (a lamp-lit room at night). Follow the priority order strictly: open your aperture as far as the shot allows first; add any light you have second; only then raise ISO until the image is usable. Record the final ISO. Now argue, in three sentences, why "a little noisy but usable" beat "clean but too dark to see" for this shot — and what an editor could and couldn't do about each.

D. The ND filter (Shoot This + Fix the Shot)

14. ⭐ Read the ladder. Without looking back: how many stops does an ND8 remove? What's the "ND number" name for a 6-stop filter? If f/2.8 at 1/50 s and native ISO is six stops too bright, which single filter fixes it? Then explain in one sentence why these three labels — stops, ND number, density — all describe the same piece of glass. (Answer provided.)

15. ⭐⭐ Hold the shutter outdoors. On a bright day, shoot a moving subject (someone walking, a passing bike) two ways: first letting your camera or phone auto-expose (it will silently speed the shutter up); then with the shutter pinned at 1/50 s and an ND filter (or clip-on) bringing exposure into range. Compare how the motion looks in each. Describe the difference in one paragraph and name the hidden cause. This clip is your personal, permanent proof of why ND exists — keep it. (Model critique provided.)

16. ⭐⭐ The variable-ND sweep. If you have a variable ND, frame an evenly-lit wall and slowly rotate the filter from its minimum to its maximum while recording. Note two points: where the image goes usefully dark, and where (near the extreme) an ugly dark "X" or a color cast appears. Now you know your filter's usable range — and why cheap variable NDs are a false economy. (Answer explains what you found.) If you only have fixed NDs, instead swap between two strengths on the same shot and confirm each drops the waveform by exactly its rated number of stops.

17. ⭐⭐ Fix the shot. A described clip: a shooter nailed a beautiful bright-exterior walk-and-talk with six stops of ND, then followed the subject indoors and kept rolling — and the interior footage is dark, grainy, and was shot at ISO 12800. Name exactly what went wrong, the one-second fix they skipped, and the correct re-exposure order once inside. (Answer provided.)

18. ⭐⭐⭐ Phone cinematic outdoors. Using a phone and a manual-camera app (and a clip-on ND if you have one, or shooting in open shade if you don't), capture a 15-second bright-outdoor shot of something moving that actually respects the 180° rule: shutter near 1/50 s, motion with natural blur, exposure judged on the app's scope. Write down every setting. If you can't get the exposure down without an ND, stop and write two sentences on exactly why — that frustration is the lesson, and it's the most persuasive argument for a $20 clip-on filter you'll ever make yourself.

E. Reading the scopes (Read the Sequence + Shoot This)

19. ⭐ Read the waveform. Look again at FIGURE 5.3 in the chapter. In your own words, describe what the "underexposed," "good," and "overexposed" traces each show, where the important tones sit in each, and state which of the two failures can never be fixed in post — and why. (Answer provided.)

20. ⭐⭐ Expose to a number. Put a waveform on your image (in-camera, in a phone app, or by shooting into an editor with live scopes). Frame a face and expose it so the skin sits in the upper-middle of the graph — roughly 60–70 — with nothing pinned at 0 or 100. Screenshot the scope. Now do it for a second face with a clearly different skin tone and note where its "correct" placement actually falls. Write one sentence on why forcing both to the same number would be a mistake. (Model answer provided.)

21. ⭐⭐ Zebras two ways. Set your zebras (camera or monitor) to about 95–100% and find the exposure where stripes just appear on your subject's brightest highlight — that's your clipping edge; back off until they vanish. Then set them to about 70% and expose until stripes just kiss the cheeks. Do the two methods land near the same exposure? If they disagree sharply, what does that tell you about the contrast in your frame? (Answer discusses what to expect.)

22. ⭐⭐⭐ Learn your false-color key. Turn on false color (camera, monitor, or app). By pointing at things you know are bright, mid, and dark (a lamp, a grey wall, a shadow), identify your device's colors for three things: clipping, correctly-exposed skin, and the noise floor. Write your personal three-color key on a note you keep. Then expose a face using only false color and confirm on the waveform that you got it right. Once these three colors are memorized, false color becomes the fastest exposure tool you own. (Model answer provided.)

23. ⭐⭐ Read the sequence. A described shot: an interview subject sits with a bright window behind them; on the waveform, the skin sits around 25 and the window is a solid wall pinned at 100. Name the two exposure problems, say which is fatal and which is recoverable, and prescribe two different on-set fixes. (Answer provided.)

24. ⭐⭐ Which tool when. For each situation, name the best exposure-judging tool and why: (a) run-and-gun handheld at an event, no time to study a graph; (b) locking a precise skin exposure on a Log talking-head; (c) checking whether a bright sky is about to clip while composing. There isn't one right tool for everything — matching the tool to the moment is the skill. (Answer provided.)

F. Exposing Log and protecting highlights (Fix the Shot + Shoot This)

25. ⭐ The flat-image trap. A shooter says: "My Log footage looks grey and washed out, so I brightened it on set until it looked normal." What's the predictable disaster, why does the flat image hide it, and what should they have judged the exposure with instead? (Answer provided.)

26. ⭐⭐ Protect the highlight. Shoot a scene with one very bright element (a window, a sky, a lamp). Deliberately shoot two takes: one that clips the bright element to 100, one that holds detail in it (protecting the highlight) even if the shadows go a little dark. In an editor, try to recover detail in the bright element of both. Report exactly what you can and can't get back — this is the most convincing hands-on proof of the whole "protect the highlights" rule. (Model critique provided.)

27. ⭐⭐⭐ Expose to your camera's Log targets. If you can shoot Log, find your manufacturer's recommended middle-grey and white-card values (their Log exposure guide). Using false color or the waveform, place a grey card and a white card at those targets. Now shoot a face in the same light and note where the skin lands. Write down the whole recipe so it's repeatable. (If you can't shoot Log, instead explain in three sentences why the flat image can't be judged by eye and what two tools you'd use instead.)

28. ⭐⭐ The ETTR argument. In four sentences, explain "expose to the right" for Log: why brightening cleans up shadows, and the hard limit that stops you. Then name one situation where you would use it and one where you wouldn't. (Answer provided.)

G. The workflow, locked (Recreate It + Settings Drill)

29. ⭐⭐ Run the six steps. Recreate FIGURE 5.4 from memory as a checklist, then actually run it on any subject, writing your setting at each step. Time yourself. The goal is to get the whole routine under a minute — because on a real shoot, exposure is the thirty seconds before every setup, not a project. (Answer provides the checklist to check against.)

30. ⭐⭐ Match two shots. Expose and lock a shot of a subject. Move the camera to a new angle on the same subject in the same light, and expose the second shot to the same targets using your written notes — not by eye. In an editor, lay them side by side: do they match? Where they don't, name exactly what drifted (the light? your eye? a setting you forgot to note?). This is the exact skill that makes the color chapters (31) easy instead of miserable. (Model answer provided.)

31. ⭐⭐⭐ Five Ways: one face, five exposures. Light one face by a window. Shoot it five ways, changing only exposure: (a) correct (skin 60–70); (b) one stop under; (c) one stop over; (d) protecting the window highlight, letting the face fall a bit dark; (e) a deliberate silhouette (expose for the bright window, let the face go black). Watch all five back to back. Which serves "warm and inviting"? Which serves "mysterious" or "ominous"? Name the story each exposure tells, and connect at least one of them to The Godfather analysis in Case Study 1. (Model answer discusses each.)

32. ⭐ Settings drill — the four setups. Without looking, write starting exposures (ISO / aperture / ND, at 24 fps / 1/50 s) for: (a) a window-lit talking head; (b) a bright-sun walk-and-talk; (c) a product on a table; (d) a dim event room. Then check against the chapter's Settings Box and note where your instinct differed. (Answer provided.)

H. Interleaved (mixing earlier chapters)

33. ⭐⭐ Shutter, aperture, ISO together (Ch.2 + Ch.4 + Ch.5). You're shooting 24 fps. State the shutter (Ch.2). You want a soft background, so you pick an aperture (Ch.4) — which one, and what does it do besides let in light? Now it's too bright outdoors — what do you add, and why not just change the shutter? Walk the whole chain in five sentences. (Answer provided.)

34. ⭐⭐ From capture to exposure (Ch.3 + Ch.5). You chose to shoot Log back in Chapter 3 for maximum gradeability. List two exposure disciplines this chapter says Log now demands of you on set, the one thing you must never do, and how the extra dynamic range helps you protect a bright sky. (Answer provided.)

35. ⭐⭐ Depth of field meets ND (Ch.4 + Ch.5). You're outdoors and want deep focus — everything sharp, f/11 — for a wide landscape-style establishing shot at 24 fps. Do you still need ND? Work it out: is f/11 at 1/50 s and native ISO likely to be over- or under-exposed in bright sun, and what does that tell you about when ND is and isn't necessary? (Answer provided.)

36. ⭐⭐⭐ The full Project 1 pass (Ch.1–5). For your Project 1 talking-head, write the complete technical recipe you've now assembled across Part I: concept in one line (Ch.1), resolution + frame rate (Ch.2), capture format (Ch.3), focal length + aperture (Ch.4), and exposure — ISO, ND, and how you'll judge it (Ch.5). This single note is your shooting card for the shoot, and finishing it means you have taken full command of the camera. (Model answer shows a strong version.)

When you can run the six-step workflow in under a minute, hit a skin-tone target on a waveform without thinking, and reach for ND by reflex in bright light, you have command of exposure — the last piece of taking command of the camera itself. Move on to Chapter 6, where we stop worrying about whether the image is clean and start deciding what belongs inside the frame at all.