Well done Steve!! You made something that is quite complex to understand very simple. I well be starting to use exposure compensation. Thanks and have a great day.
Steve, that was a good video and you explained it in very basic terms that are easily understood. I've watched other videos on the subject and as with anything it all depends on the instructor. Some are able to break things down easily and others not so much. Thx.
Great job man! This was really helpful. I captured a lotttttt of greyish blue snow in February when the snow in the Tetons was 4 feet deep hahah. Guess ill have to come back and try again.
Thank you Steve for clear explanation. Yes, exposure compensation is essential to be used. Nearly 100% of my shots are not taken with +-0. But I got used to taking advantage matrix measuring quite some time ago. Matrix (at least Canon's I am familiar with) does not try to get gray but to avoid blown out white and black. I got used to take advantage of technology and typically shoot with -2/3 auto exposure. For special situations or creativity I go further down or up. This covers 100% of "fast shooting". Special effects, stitching, bracketing, ... is done manually setting of aperture, shutter & ISO. I do not take care of metering at all, I use the histogram instead. Yes, this can be done in EVF if shooting mirrorless. But mostly those shots are taken with the help of the big screen anyway, DSLR or mirrorless. Before I switched using Matrix measuring (back in times with film SLR) I used spot metering, but always manual exposure. Exposure compensation is already implicitly done with balancing aperture and shutter speed.
You said in a previous video, "If you aren't using exposure compensation; well you should be...", I'm still on the lower end of the huge photography learning curve and acted on that, found it very useful in the dark of the north woods in the local park. This video confirmed I'm doing it right. Thanks once again Steve.
Great video. I've struggled with the concept of EC for a long time. Your visuals with the white and black background and understanding how the camera wants to shoot gray is awesome. I now get it! I wish my Nikon/Tamron lenses worked on mirrorless because I sure want a mirrorless camera for landscapes, sports and portraiture. I'll stick to my Nikon D500/200-500mm for birding for now. I'm basically afraid to buy new DSLR lenses.
GOOD SOUND ADVICE.... ALTHOUGH I never use auto anything other than auto focus. In manual mode once you discover the corect exposure and your subject remains in that light you never have to rely on your camera setting anything. I spot read a known area and adjust my exposure plus or minus myself from there. White plus 1-3 stops Blacks minus 1-3 stop depending on how much light is on your metering area. It's all under one light source our sun / shade or whatever. Every day same sun,same light,same exposure. Back in the film days I didn't have a meter in my cameras. You will learn quickly how to read and understand light at the different a.s.a. speeds using the sunny f16 rule. Practice, practice, practice.
I use it a lot. Slightly underexposed gives better color on my camera. Also used it in a cavern where they said no flash allowed. I opened the lense all the way and did +2 exposure. I could not see anything but white in the viewfinder but the picture came out great.
Good explanation of what exposure compensation is and how it works. I've noticed from watching landscape photographers in particular on RU-vid, some seem to exclusively use manual mode (Thomas Heaton, as an example), while others are devoted to aperture priority with exposure compensation (Dave Morrow, as an example). These guys make great photographs, and the thing they both rely upon to do it is by paying close attention to the histogram and by knowing how their specific cameras (both of them Canon users it turns out) handle the light. I typically use manual mode myself, but I appreciate learning how to go both ways.
Truth.👍 One thing to mention is that when shooting landscapes, the photographer often has plenty of time to set up the perfect exposure. Shooting wildlife, you often don't so automatic modes can be very helpful.
Great video! I would not have thought to add exposure compensation when shooting a white bird. The spot metering idea sounds like it will help a lot to learn this technique. Thank you!
Well it depends... If you are spot metering off the bird, then yes you add exposure. If there is a dark background and you are using matrix metering then you'd likely do the opposite. Because the camera would see the overall scene as being quite dark and would brighten the exposure to make it 'gray' - which would overexpose the bird... I know, it can be confusing...
A positive EC would cause the histogram to shift to the right, i.e. add exposure. A negative EC would cause a shift to the left. Positive EC increases the exposure by opening the aperture (in shutter priority mode) or slowing the shutter (in aperture priority mode) to increase the light on the sensor. Negative would do the opposite.
A balanced exposure would capture the scene where all the tones were as they appeared at the time with nothing "clipped" on either side of the histogram. The "right" exposure is whatever you want it to be. If your intention was to make the snow look grey instead of white, or a black cat to look grey instead of black, then that was the "right" exposure.
I use EC on my D850, but on my Z7 where I shoot 99% of the time in Manual mode using Matrix metering. I just adjust my shutter speed until I get the exposure I want.
The exposure comp method you describe certainly works for shooting JPG files or transparencies (remember those? LOL). For RAW files, optimal data comes from saturating the sensor without blowing the highlights, aka expose to the right. Your dark forest example exposed for optimal data will look too bright in the camera and on import to the computer because the embedded JPG file does have too much exposure to look good. If shooting RAW + JPG and you need a well exposed JPG file of the dark forest right out of the camera, the RAW file data will be less than optimal with more noise and probably less detail in the shadows. Then again, if what you're doing works for you and makes you happy, keep doing it. Heaven knows your photos are amazing and for sure much better than mine.
Yes, this video was not intended to address ettr and sensor saturation, that is a much more complex discussion... That said, using exposure compensation will help people ettr if that is their desire.
Changing the ISO does nothing to change the exposure as the camera compensates for the change; the appearance of the image will be the same. EC causes a change in the aperture or shutter speed (depending on exposure mode) to increase or decrease the exposure resulting in an brighter or darker image.
Great explanation as to what exposure compensation is and how it works. Have you found that using exposure compensation results in better images than not using exposure compensation and adjusting exposure during post processing? Thanks.
Yes. There are super-nerdy discussions about this online and there are some very specific situations where you might not notice any difference but for 99.9 percent of us, it will look better getting it right in camera...
Under exposing will actually give less light to the sensor, and therefore less color information. It is better to expose to the right (overexpose a bit), then lower the exposure in Lightroom (or whatever feet you use).
Steve Mattheis - that’s what I’ve always heard and was my experience. As I understood your message, you recommended under exposing to keep blacks true which would lose details in the shadows. So how often do you adjust exposure compensation to the negative and are you concerned about losing that detail? I usually expose 1 stop to the right for most situations.
hello Steve , if you using aperture priority , and manual ISO , exposure compensation will change the shutter speed , lower speed to increase the light or higher speed to decrease the light , am 'I right ? so with moving subject it's not easy to choose , thanks
While I've always used it, what does that camera change to account for that? For example, if I'm in Aperture Priority and take a picture of a bird against the bright sky, I'll dial in +2 to start. But does the camera change the ISO, Aperture, or shutter speed to adjust the image? Or something else? Thanks!
You can see your shutter speed in the viewfinder before your press the shutter release. Some people prefer manual mode and some don't... I prefer knowing how to use both effectively.
@@SteveMattheis Here's how it works in my D750 and I'm pretty sure the D850 is the same. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-mzOlI9SqPmE.html
Good video. This is how I used to expose slide film but the general advice with digital is to "expose to the right" in order to maximize the shadow information. Do you disagree with that?
I agree that ettr will maximize sensor saturation and potential image quality. But that's not necessarily important for people who are just learning the basics, or who don't want to spend much time post-processing, or who don't care about extracting the maximum possible image quality (which is a lot of people). Exposure compensation can help you ettr, or help you get the exposure you want in camera, so I think it's a valuable tool either way.
One of the best tutorials I've seen on this subject, thank you Steve. I can certainly understand the bear in the snow or the black cat in a dark room but what if you've got an almost black Seal on a very light beach and you are using spot metering. This is where I get confused.
Tough situation. You have to decide if you want the seal properly exposed and blow out the background or have the beach properly exposed then try to lift the shadows of the seal on Lightroom...
@@SteveMattheis No what I mean is, if you're shooting Raw doesn't matter if you're a little out in exposure, it only matters if your're shooting jpegs?
I'm guessing that this is at conflict with back button focus, because in recomposing and setting the shutter button to expose, you are now possibly exposing away from the main subject?
@@SteveMattheis I have the 7D II and I'm pretty sure it reads off the focus point, which is most likely going to be in the middle if I'm using back button focus to recompose. That's one of the things I haven't liked about BBF, because I'll find the exposure is suddenly drastically changed. Do you know of any way round this?
Adam Young there are a bunch of ways to solve this, too many to address here... But here are three ideas to try 1-move your focus point to keep it on your subject 2-try matrix or evaluative meeting mode which looks at the entire frame instead of just the spot near the focus point 3-enable AE lock with shutter button
@@SteveMattheis I'll look at the last one as that mostly applies to me. For the most part I try to move the focus point, but it kind of negates the benefits of back button focus. Thank you for taking the time out of your busy life to get back to me. Appreciated.
I use it on manual mode +1 just so I can see the meter up to 4 stops instead of 3 and pretty much just leave it there on spot meter (highlights). I end up shooting +1 or +2 stops. Still haven't found a faster way to shoot than manual.
Well explained but photographers need to 'feel' the compensation so as you indicated, the sooner they start using it the sooner they will feel the setting.
Exposure compensation actually works in full manual mode (even without ISO-auto) ... BUT, not that it affects the exposure, only the exposure meter in the camera. I use it a lot even if I am on total manual mode, then I kan change ISO, aperture or speed to the settings the exposure meter thinks is good. :)
So, today's cameras are pretty dumb in that they don't know what they are looking at, except they can detect an eye for autofocus purposes. How long do you suppose it will be before the engineers add more Artificial Intelligence (AI) to the point where the camera can recognize whole scenes and make smarter exposure decisions than just the 17% gray? Or, are smartphones taking over so much of the market that the manufacturers will never make the investment required? I wonder.
