NYFalls.com Talk

My current method of setting exposure is by taking a picture at a random shutter + aperture determined by instinct, seeing it's too dark/bright, changing the shutter speed, taking another picture, seeing if that one's still too dark/bright, etc, etc

I am 100% sure there is a better way to do that. But I don't know what it is. Help a relative newbie out?

Hi. 2 things come to mind. Both are based on the fact that you already seem to have a great grasp on exposure if you're able to work in manual mode "by instinct".

1) Rather than shooting in full Manual mode - try either Shutter Priority mode or Aperture Priority mode - letting your camera do half of the guesswork. Then by looking quickly at your image and/or histogram on the LCD, you can use Exposure Compensation (+ / -) to adjust exposure relatively quickly for your subsequent shots. The second is just an offshoot of the first.....

2) Experiment with Bracketing to give yourself more leeway in terms of what exposure you want to end up with.

Neither is "better" than your way - but maybe a little faster, when time is an issue.

Kelly wrote:Hi. 2 things come to mind. Both are based on the fact that you already seem to have a great grasp on exposure if you're able to work in manual mode "by instinct". :up:

1) Rather than shooting in full Manual mode - try either Shutter Priority mode or Aperture Priority mode - letting your camera do half of the guesswork. Then by looking quickly at your image and/or histogram on the LCD, you can use Exposure Compensation (+ / -) to adjust exposure relatively quickly for your subsequent shots. The second is just an offshoot of the first.....

Ah, so that's what that button does. On my camera (sony alpha 100) I have to hold it down and adjust it with the scroll wheel, which is somewhat counter-habit but then using the viewfinder instead of the screen was also counter-habit and I adjusted to that so shouldn't be a problem.

2) Experiment with Bracketing to give yourself more leeway in terms of what exposure you want to end up with.

Neither is "better" than your way - but maybe a little faster, when time is an issue.

I think I'll try that for wildlife, at least, in future. Have tried it before with waterfalls because I couldn't guess what exposure to choose with a ND filter attached, but that meant turning off the 2s self-timer, so my pictures ended up blurry due to me pressing the camera button too forcefully. #fauxtographyproblems

I have an alpha 700, and just keep it in program mode. I'm not sure how the 100 works, but I just get the base exposure the camera thinks is good, and if I want a different shutter speed, I spin the control wheel until the one I want is set, then take a shot. Looking at the histogram of the resulting exposure, and the "blinkies" for any over- or under-exposed areas, I then adjust exposure compensation up or down as needed. Mostly you want the highlights to be properly exposed and just hope the shadows are OK. You can always adjust the shadows a bit in post-processing, but if a highlight is over-exposed there's nothing there to work with.

If the range is too much for the sensor to hold everything important, that's when you consider doing HDR, but that's a different kettle of fish.

For wildlife, you want a pretty fast shutter speed usually, which might mean bumping your ISO up a notch or two. The good rule of thumb is the bottom number on your shutter speed should equal, or higher than the focal length of the lens you're using. If you have a 300mm lens, then nothing under 1/300th second exposure, and 1/500th would be better. In this instance, you want shutter priority, set it at a good value you can hold the lens at, using the above rule, then let the camera handle aperture, for the most part, it's going to be on the wide end of what your lens can handle.

For waterfalls and landscapes on a tripod, better depth of field is what you want usually, depending on the subject, so a smaller aperture and longer shutter speed is needed. That, of course, is all dependent on what type of photo you are trying for.

I don't use automated exposure bracketing anymore because cameras use a combination of Aperture tuning, shutter tuning, and post processing to vary the exposure (it depends on your camera, mode, and available light.

I have to be in control of aperture, so I use shutter bracketing only. So I do essentially what you are, but don't start with a random exposure, your camera meter should tell you by turning the shutter speed green or white or whatever to tell you when it matches the meter settings.