Thanks for the detailed help Humayun. I perhaps naively thought limiting to the central sensor would allow me to pick what I want to meter on more precisely, but I suspect the Canon's evaluative routines will be smarter than me, so I better turn them back on for next time. Couple of queries if you chance back this way:
1. Do you use auto bracketing, or chose the variation settings yourself.
2. Umm - what's hyperfocal distance focusing (I better head off to Google....
)
Regards,
R
Quote:
Originally Posted by Octane
Rob,
That looks like an awesome place. Will have to check it out some day and get some images.
As to the metering issue you had -- if the camera was set to full evaluative metering (which it typically is by default) then it really doesn't matter if you point the central AF point to where you want to expose. The scene is divided in to 35 zones which the camera meters individually and then averages out for the scene.
To get a proper exposure for a particular point, you need to switch to either centre-weighted metering or spot metering. I can't remember the spot size on the crop sensor Canon's, but, on my 5D Mark II the spot covers 3% of the viewfinder's centre (from memory). It was either 3% of 6%. This makes an enormous difference when it comes to exposing correctly.
Most of the time, however, evaluative metering with bracketing, and blending in post will get you there. The way I do it is to typically take one "properly" exposed image and then use that rather than work with separate images as sometimes you end with slight shifts in composition between exposures -- especially on a windy day. I also turn auto focus off once I've composed my scene and make the appropriate adjustments manually (hyperfocal distance focusing, typically).
Cheers.
H
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