> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://journey.davidknoble.life/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Protecting Highlights with the EV1 - URL: https://journey.davidknoble.life/protecting-highlights-with-the-ev1/ - Published: 2026-07-22T14:23:41.000Z - Updated: 2026-07-26T10:38:11.000Z - Description: Blown highlights can easily ruin an otherwise great image. Here’s how to protect them with no additional steps and save the image every time. - Author: David Knoble - Tags: 4. In Practice, Leica M EV(1) I love clouds. Their majestic stature associates them with the old gods of Greek mythology, and, like the ocean, they are never the same twice. Yet, specular highlights are some of the trickiest aspects of metering an image. ### Film-Based Average Metering If we think back to exposing film images on a Leica M6 or MP, we were confronted with the same situations. The white dot painted on the shutter cloth facing the lens opening reflected light to a small metering diode. That provided an average brightness that was weighted towards the middle of the image frame. The metering system of two triangles with a red dot in the middle helped set the exposure for middle gray, on average. Coincidentally, that same metering pattern is used on all the digital Leica M bodies, until the EV1, that is. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/28/88/28888718-3151-40e0-92e4-bf1a38db79a2/content/images/2026/07/Journey-SL3-L1020864.jpg) Metering reflective patch on the cloth shutter from a Leica MP film camera. When setting exposures for film on these metering systems, I would have to think about the subject. If I were taking portraits, then right away I knew getting the red dot in the middle would reward me with a gray portrait. Yuck! Skin tones are rarely just middle gray! But I could open a stop for lighter skin and close down a 1/2 stop for dark skin and get what was more like reality. How does that relate to highlights? Snow, white clouds, sunlit streams - they all have incredibly bright areas and average metering doesn’t help so much. When confronted with those situations, many film photographers would fall back to using either a domed incident light meter or a reflected spot meter. I’ll save those concepts for another discussion, but in this context, that means slow metering. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/28/88/28888718-3151-40e0-92e4-bf1a38db79a2/content/images/2026/07/Journey-EV1-L1000046-2-1.jpg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/28/88/28888718-3151-40e0-92e4-bf1a38db79a2/content/images/2026/07/Journey-EV1-L1000048-2.jpg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/28/88/28888718-3151-40e0-92e4-bf1a38db79a2/content/images/2026/07/Journey-EV1-L1000050-1.jpg) Protecting highlights on front-lit and back-lit clouds -**Rock Hill, SC* ### Modern Digital Leica M Metering From the Leica M8 through to today’s Leica M11 series, the red dot surrounded by triangles has been maintained. Another testament to Leica Camera’s ability to integrate consistency for decades and make picking up an M camera from any era usable right beside one made yesterday. Leica even used white and gray patches on the outside of the leaf shutter to reflect back to a diode for light measurements! As sensor technology advanced, Leica added other metering techniques to the digital systems. In addition to the simple average metering consistent with the film bodies, the shutter would open, allowing the sensor to become a light meter. This is a double-edged sword. When the shutter is open, it must first close before tripping again to take a photograph. Rolling shutter effects have not yet been completely eliminated, and although read times have decreased on sensors, the quicker fix is to leave the shutter open and read the image. Over time, Leica added such metering methods as spot metering, multi-metering, and highlight weighted average metering. Highlight-weighted average metering is a digital photographer’s dream. The concept is to take the average metering of the scene, and then look for the brightest section, lowering the exposure to ensure that bright area wasn’t overexposed and detail permanently lost. Remember that film is exposed for the shadows to avoid losing details, but for a negative, the shadows are the clear parts of the negative - or the highlights! ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/28/88/28888718-3151-40e0-92e4-bf1a38db79a2/content/images/2026/07/Journey-SL3-L1020867.jpg) The Leica M11 uses the sensor for metering, so no reflective patch is on the shutter, now made from metal. Leica made advances in scene analysis and improved highlight protection using this new metering method. One drawback is that the JPEG out of the camera is much darker, sometimes too dark. This is one reason capturing RAW or DNG images is so important. Post-editing can lift those shadows and keep the highlights where they were exposed. So, why even discuss this highlight protection related to the EV1? ### More Control with the EV1 I’ve been using the SL system since it was introduced in 2015, which was not the first Leica camera with an EVF, but arguably the best EVF of the time. With the SL gone were the red triangles and dots, replaced with a metered scale from minus exposure to plus exposure, the same as the one in the SLR Leica R8/R9 system and the DSLR Leica S system. As far back as 2015, we were using the EVF view to help anticipate exposure. Thinking about the concept, it makes perfect sense. Looking through the sensor, one should be able to set an f/stop and then adjust the shutter speed (or vice versa) until the EVF showed the perfect exposure. If only it were that simple! One factor that can ruin that method is the brightness of the EVF, which [I quickly found out again](https://journey.davidknoble.life/lesson-learned-brightness-and-cloudy-days/) in my first week with the EVF. The pixel size of the EVF is also very small compared to the sensor, so not every detail is shown in the display or even on the LCD back display. Then, you throw in the lower contrast and color space of the EVF compared to the sensor, and nothing works as expected. Yet, Leica has come far from 2015. The view inside the EVF is still a great way to view what exposure you would like to achieve when pressing the shutter. However, another tool is also important to ensure the highlights are protected while still retaining full control of the exposure. While highlight-weighted average metering is one technique, it was made for rangefinder use when it wasn’t practical to see the image from the sensor. Moving the eye from rangefinder to LCD is not practical. The solution was using a separate EVF accessory, but even that had drawbacks in size and cost. ### My Solution The solution that I use on the SL system is the same solution I recommend here. It is unique to EVF’s and keeps the photographic process fast without getting in the way. Most importantly, what you see is likely what you get! My solution is to add Clipping to my first Info Profile. This allows me to focus and see when the highlights are clipping on the EVF. I can adjust the shutter speed until the highlights are no longer clipping, regardless of the metering method. When I press the shutter, I get a well-exposed image. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/28/88/28888718-3151-40e0-92e4-bf1a38db79a2/content/images/2026/07/Journey-SL3-L1020875.jpg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/28/88/28888718-3151-40e0-92e4-bf1a38db79a2/content/images/2026/07/Journey-SL3-L1020876.jpg) Menu for turning on clipping for the Info Profile on the EV1 The rangefinder system fails me because I’m still guessing about the best exposure that just stops clipping the highlights. Even with highlight-weighted average metering, the image might not be dark enough. The only way to tell is to press Play on the LCD. This is one area the EV1 excels. 💡 Add Clipping to your first Info Profile so that each time you take an image, any over- or under-exposure that causes clipping shows up. Adjust your exposure until the clipping is gone. To set the Clipping, use the Capture Assistants menu, select the first Info Profile and ensure Clipping is selected. Customize the upper and lower limits to your liking.