Canon 5D MK III, Going From Manual To AV

[steve_c]

Hi all

Following my thread here, after a member saying that shooting in manual was a strange way of doing things (over Av for street shots etc), I decided to go and give it a try.

As I said in the original thread, I am very new to photography and picking things up as I go.

I am a little confused as to what the process of shooting in Av is.

Originally, when shooting in manual, I would take the following approach (for street or portrait work):

1) Establish WB and ISO needed for scene
2) Dial in desired apperture and guess at shutter speed
3) Centre the viewfinder on subject and dial back / forward SS to expose correctly
4) Half-press the shutter button to focus
5) Recompose
6) Shoot

I am now trying to shoot in Av:

1) Establish WB and ISO needed for scene
2) Dial in desired apperture
3) Centre the viewfinder and half-press the shutter to focus
4) Recompose

When I recompose, the light meter re-calibrates to whatever is in the centre of the viewfinder and usually my subject will be incorrectly exposed.

I am certain that this is a ridiculous question (I re-iterate that I am beginner) but what am I doing wrong?

Do I lock in exposure first and then focus / recompose?

Thanks in advance as usual...

 

[steve_c]

Hi Raymond

Thanks for the reply.

I am still a little confused.

The metering is taken from the centre is it not?

If my subject is to the right of the frame and I use the focus point in that area, am I knot still metering for the centre of the frame?

Thanks again

 

[steve_c]

As above, two more things though: use back button AF if you don't already do so, and set up the camera so that half pressing the shutter button locks the exposure only. That way you separate focus and exposure so it's a bit like shooting manual except the camera does the number crunching/dial spinning for you. That way your process ends up looking like this:

1 - Point at subject, Av decides the exposure
2 - Half press shutter to lock the exposure
3 - Select AF point
4 - Press AF ON button so the camera focuses
5 - Fully press the shutter, take photo

Hi

Thanks very much

So that is starting to make sense. I have heard about swapping these buttons over on another forum.

So I can use the cursor to move focus to a different point so that I do not have to recompose? Recomposing always seemed to be a quicker option rather than changing focus points...

 

[steve_c]

ISO should be the last exposure modification to make (if you make it at all)

1) Simply select the aperture you want for the scene to give the depth of focus you want, e.g. eye in focus only, whole head in focus, couple in focus, whole scene in focus, foreground-to back ground in focus.
1) b) Occasional you ant to override the auto exposure little using exposure compensation for strongly back lit scenes or if you want to force black shadows in a silhouette - a little EC change if needed
1) b) ii) make sure you are using the appropriate metering mode and have it tuned to your desire.

2) Double check shutter speed is fast enough for the focal length and movement, if not
up the ISO.

2) b) Learn to use auto ISO, there is not much point in changing the ISO reach the desired shutter speed manually. Some cameras don't handle different shutter speeds for different focal lengths but the newer models often allow you to set up rules, e.g. 1/30th at 24mm and 1/100th at 70mm etc.


Don't focus and recompose, choose the focus point closest to the subject- you can experience horrible focus issues at shallow DoF. Fast lenses typically have strong field curvature so focus will be drastically different from the center to edge. Acquire a rough focus first before exposing because in all exposure modes the focus point has influence, even in matrix mode. Once exposure is set confirm focus.


Rarely a need to ever touch WB, specially not in a dynamic scene. just leave it on auto. The only time it makes sense is when shooting things like landscapes on a tripod and you are using ETTR (exposing to the right). When you review histograms to check exposure the histograms are based on the embedded jpeg, so colour and contrast will affect the RGB histograms and make it harder to find colour channel clipping points. Shooting street you should never care about WB really.

Al of this should be natural and very fast. If you setup auto ISO correctly then you are left with selecting an aperture and focus point. The aperture choice is normally trivial, just don't go too wide when you need things like a wedding couple to both be on focus when the are not parallel to you. a lot of the time you wont even have to bother changing the aperture.

Your work is now reduced to getting a good composition of a good moment, not fiddling with meaningless settings that can be done better by the camera than you in most situations.

Fantastic advice. Thanks very much for taking the time to post.

The metering is done differently based on whatever metering mode you are using, if you use matrix metering then the entire scene is evaluated with a weighting towards which ever focus point you have. If you use spot metering then it will mostly adjust exposure to the focus point only and ignore the rest of the scene, if you use center weighted then it is like matrix but puts more weight to the center - but you center weighted is pretty useless for most things.

Those are the basics, each camera will behave slightly differently.

OK that seems to make sense. However. I am using spot metering on the 5D and it is still not taking the reading from the selected focus point.

 

[steve_c]

Thank, Raymond.

I will give it a whirl.

Actually, just having a browse around and it looks as if the 1D can manage spot metering from a different focus point but unfortunately the 5D is without this feature.

Many posts advising the switching the focus / exp lock around so am going to try that. Seems strange to me but I'm sure I will get used to it.

 

[steve_c]

Thanks, Andy

I've been trying it today and it's really alien to me.

Manual shooting with recomposing felt really natural. The back button focusing (with choosing focus point) and exposure locking is taking me a lot longer to frame and correctly expose a photo.

I'm sure it's because I'm very new to this technique and I know that recomposing really have a negative effect (especially with really fast lenses such as the 50mm 1.2 I'm using) so I will stick with it and persevere...

 

[steve_c]

Great points about the ISO and WB. Probably could save a fair bit of time just leaving those on manual and changing anything like that in post.

I've spent a day shooting with the back button focus and using shutter button to lock exposure.

It's painfully slow and seems convoluted when compared with the speed that I tend to do things at in manual.

If I'm on the street and I want to shoot a portrait (in manual), I usually centre the subject, adjust shutter to expose, half press to focus and recompose / shoot. Further shots in the same lighting conditions are obviously executed a lot faster.

With the new way of doing things in Av: Centering subject and locking exposure, moving focus point, back button to focus and then shutter to take the shot seems to be taking far longer and doesn't feel quite "right".

I'll give it a few more days and see how it feels...

Once again, thank you all for the input.

 

[steve_c]

I think you're changing too much at once, I'd say try back button AF + manual for a week or two so you get used to separating focusing from the shutter release, then once that feels natural throw Av + exposure locking/compensation.

This is a great idea. I will give it a shot.

I think you are sill making this overly complex.

No need to center subject, or lock exposure, or fiddle with too many buttons.

All you have to do is compose your photo and select the focus point over the subject at the aperture you want. It is extremely fast and incredibly simply, no need to half press things or do anything else weird 99% of the time.

I understand what you are saying but many times, the background is lighter or darker than my subject *and* I want to frame my subject to the left or right.

If I am not framing my subject in the centre, the metering will be off even if I select a different focus point.

The 5D III (AFAIK) takes metering from the centre only (I use either spot or partial). Av will adjust the shutter speed to correctly expose the centre of the frame or am I missing something?

 

[steve_c]

Hi D.P

Yes the 5D Mark III only takes metering off the centre. The "1" series can meter off of selected focus points.

I understand that exposure comp is the key to making this method work. I am having a tough time figuring out if it would save me any time over using manual but obviously I will give it a good shot...

I definitely can see the advantages of focusing via a different button. So I am going to try and convert as I've heard many people discuss the merits of this technique

Thanks again

 

[steve_c]

Great post, thanks very much D.P

I have DOF preview for AI Servo switch which has come in really useful.

There's quite an interesting thread on the spot metering issue here:

http://www.canonrumors.com/forum/index.php?topic=5555.0

I wonder if something like Magic Lantern would unlock the feature. It's possible I suppose.

I'll definitely try less focus points. I hardly ever shoot any sports / wildlife so do not really have a need for so many options.

I'm sure that in a few days I'll finally see what all the fuss is about! I must admit that I have missed a few shots due to altering exposure in manual so hopefully I can become adept at using Av for situations which require capturing the right "moment"

Thanks again