Live View Exposure Simulation (Canon 60D)

dibbly dobbler

dibbly dobbler

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Mike
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Hi All.

Hoping somebody can help me with this please. I am hoping to use the exposure simulation setting on live view to help me compose night shots but for the life of me I can't get it to work! It's definitely turned on but in low light the icon just flashes and it does not simulate the exposure at all - the screen is just dark and of no help :(

Is it just a case of 'they all do that sir' or do I have a problem ?

Thanks in advance :)
 
I'm not too sure what you are referring to; but it sounds like it's failing to focus...

If you're shooting at night you probably want to be on manual focus (normally set just below infinity), and have a high aperture (like f2.8). If you stick it on manual focus and M on the dial, put aperture at the highest option and move the shutter dial until the top LCD shows about mid-way that should be a good starting point.

Racking the ISO up to 6400 (or 12800 if you enable it) gives you a good starting point, (albeit a fairly unusable picture on the 60D)
 
Thanks for the reply :)

Unfortunately it's not a focussing issue - manual or auto makes no difference.

With 'exposure simulation' enabled the live view screen should approximate the exposure of the final image (I believe). The default mode - 'display' I think - just shows roughly what your eye can see.

There's a little icon on the screen which you can see when on live view - it shows 'disp' or 'exp sim' (or some such). As above it's on but doesn't seem to work - the icon flashes and the exposure is not simulated ....
 
It should be able to do what you want it to do. Mine works in exactly that way. Its funny but i could never get my mates 5DMKII to work like this.

I've done loads of night shooting with my 60D and always use live view without issues.

Ive not used my 60D for a few months so this is just from memory.
You need to make sure the meter is displaying a decent exposure. Make sure the indicator isnt all the way to the left as this would mean its under exposed so of course you will get a dark screen.

Try using manual mode, set the ISO to 100, F stop to suit, around f/8 as a starting point, and adjust the shutter speed until the exposure indicator indicator is not right on the left edge.

Of course if you have tried all this then im not sure i can help, but a dark screen is not the norm if you have the correct exposure set.

One other thing. You say you want it to help you compose your shots. In this case it might be worth turning off ExSim, as with it off you will get the brightest image possible with your lens. Although this wont show you on screen what the exposure will look like it will give you a better chance of framing the shot. Personally though i use ExSim.
 
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Gents - thanks for the replies :)

I will give it another go tonight but I am pretty confident I have had it set up to give a decent exposure in the final shot but the screen is almost completely dark.

It's annoying as I only found out about this recently - I got it to work once and it was very handy but now can't !
 
Thanks for the replies chaps :)

I've done some more (frankly rather dull!) experimentation and in summary it does work but only within rather modest parameters. On full manual in a dull light I can see the screen brighten as I lengthen the shutter or add iso but in a very dull/dark light it won't brighten the screen no matter how much time/iso etc I add - even if the resulting shot is completely blown the screen is still dark and unusable.

Can anybody please confirm if their 60D behaves in the same way ? It would be nice to know if it's a 'feature' rather than a problem ...
 
That is the way it works - just like it says in the manual, as pointed out by SixToes several posts back.
 
hollis_f said:
That is the way it works - just like it says in the manual, as pointed out by SixToes several posts back.
Click to expand...

Well yes I guess you're right and if you're implying I've been a bit of a knob then mea culpa it's not for the first time!

In my defense I did recall using this recently to help compose a night shot but I can only guess that it wasn't that dark. Also a fellow tog whose work I greatly admire, did a tutorial on star trails shots which recommended using this method - again I can only assume it wasn't pitch dark.

Anyway I think I've well and truly done this to death now so enough! :)
 
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