do you shoot in automatic or manual mode?

[Gato Moteado]

when doing regular photography (wildlife, people, etc), i shoot in manual mode for shutter speed and aperture and set ISO to auto.
i know what kind of DoF i want so i want to control the aperture.
i know what kind of shutter speeds are suitable for the gear i'm using, so i want to control that, as well.
light meters can be fooled so if i have to adjust exposure, i use the +/- exposure compensation setting and it will only change the ISO, since that is the only setting i have on automatic.

when shooting with strobes or speed-lights i shoot completely manual and adjust exposure by varying the output power of the flashes.
i normally set my ISO to 64.
for close up work with macro lenses i generally have the aperture set in the f/22 to f/29 range
shutter speed is set to 1/200...i have to back it off a bit from the normal flash sync when using the godox wireless trigger

i'm interested to hear how you set up your exposures and why.

[usonian]

1. I tried automatic ONCE. Yuck.

I think that Auto was defaulting the ISO to anything the camera wanted. I like a fixed ISO so i can use the camera as a light meter for the film cameras.

Long story short, I like aperture priority A. That lets my choice of aperture "stick" across power cycles. In P mode, the camera would choose some shutter speed and aperture every power-up.

I am really comfortable with aperture priority.

Auto focus and matrix exposure have been working ok though I will sometimes override.

Still learning how to manage the camera.

[Gato Moteado]

4. back in the film days, i used...

...aperture priority on my old nikons (FE and FM), exclusively.

ISO (ASA back then) was fixed, depending on the film loaded in the camera.

i would just dial the f-stop up or back and watch the SS until i got to a combo i liked.

[AndyS]

2. Why do it the hard way?

I shoot aperture preferred adjust exposure to my liking using the compensation dial (see it in the viewfinder/lcd display). For flash I use TTL and adjust with the compensation dial. Closeup work is done with a soft box on camera.

The OM native ISO is 200 and there isn't any advantage to going lower unless you're wanting a slow shutter speed. Sometimes I set shutter speed for BIF at 1/2000 and set ISO to float with a limit at 3200.

For closeup or macro I use f4 or 5.6 and focus stacking. You can do it hand held just like HDR.

I let the camera do as much work as I can. That's why I spend the big bucks . . .

[Gato Moteado]

6. maybe YOU can hand hold while stacking or with HDR shooting....

...but not with my shaky ass hands, unfortunately.

great work, bro!

i don't know what your softbox/diffuser looks like for macro in the field, but there are some people out there making diffusers just for field macro work and the images they are getting are mind blowing. some of these people are manufacturing and selling their diffusers, as well. have you seen this guy, for example? he's a young guy...olympus shooter from australia. he sells his custom diffusers and they're inexpensive. i'm seeing right now if his will accommodate my godox AD200 mounted on my D850 before i pull the trigger.

https://www.instagram.com/cygnustech/

[AndyS]

7. I can and do handhold HDR for up to a second or two exposure time. The EM 1 mkII has 5 stops IS

or 6 with an IS lens. Focus stacking for scenic is easy too but the greater than life size macro stuff is a little too much. I'm 74 and drink a lot of coffee (and other stuff) so I'm not the most steady.

HDR in camera: 5 exposures, longest is about 1 sec.


The mk III will hand hold Hi rez at 50 meg but not the 80 meg

The dimensions on the Oly flash are 2.75 x 1.5 inches if that helps.

[Gato Moteado]

8. even single shot macros are tough to do hand held for me....

...because moving forward or backwards even a sliver and you knock your focal plane right out of the subject. the frog shots aren't true macro (1:1) and i'm shooting at f/29 most of the time so my keeper rate is high.

regarding the diffuser, if you're interested, just follow the guy on IG and send him a DM. he'll ask what body and flash you're using so he can customize the diffuser. they even come with a modeling light so you can focus on stuff at night outside. when he quoted me a price last year it was $130 for the diffuser and $30 extra for the modeling/focusing light. but he'll reply to your IG message with all the specs and warranty info, etc.

[Grumpy Old Guy]

11. My macro lighting

I had an old mini-softbox meant for mounting directly on my flash. It was tiny, about 3"x3". I really thought it was a gimmick, and never used it. However, I found I could mount it on an elbow bracket in the hotshoe and get a pretty decent macro light. I drop the power setting down pretty low.

[Gato Moteado]

12. here's mine...

....and i crank the power way up. hard to take out in the field, though.

[Grumpy Old Guy]

13. That would be difficult to carry around in the forest.

However, that is a great setup.

[Gato Moteado]

14. luckily, the forest is right outside!

[Grumpy Old Guy]

3. I prefer manual.

I leave my cameras parked in Apeture mode so I can pick them up and immediately start shooting if necessary. However, I usually switch to manual if I can. I have a dial on the back of my Canon R5 set to ISO so I can adjust it on the fly while looking through the EVF.

I also keep a small histogram visible in my EVF. I think of it as an improvement of the old "match needle" systems we used in the old days.

[Gato Moteado]

5. i like it!

[HAB911]

9. Same as you, manual with auto ISO, for the same reasons

my type of photos, i never use flash of course

[Grumpy Old Guy]

10. I think auto ISO is amazing.

We take it for granted now, but we forget that, in the old days, we had to choose the ISO/ASA when we selected our film, and we were stuck with it for the entire roll. (I think Ilford was the only exception to this). It was the very first step in our creative process. I sometimes pinch myself when I adjust the ISO in the middle of a session.

[ManiacJoe]

15. Depends on what/where I am shooting.

Back in my film days, I shot mostly on aperture-priority. As a result, my default for my Nikon DSLRs is also aperture-priority.

Outdoors, I am shooting aperture-priority with the ISO set manually. If the sunlight drops too far, I will up the ISO manually to bring the shutter speed back to the levels I want/need. If the metering seems consistently off, a little tweaking by the +/- exposure compensation works well.

If I am shooting beach volleyball, I use the above a-priority settings with the shutter-priority settings preloaded for 1/160 second just in case I want to catch any helicopters flying by. (1/160 gets me blurred rotors.)

Indoor sports, I shoot full manual. The lighting is not changing. I don't need the camera trying to outguess me on the exposure settings.

For flash pics, I usually set the camera to full manual, with the flash running TTL for output. I normally will set the camera to ISO 800 so that the flash is not working so hard, thus prolonging the batteries.