Live View?

chrism_scotland

chrism_scotland

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Chris
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I'm currently weighting up upgrading my Sony A300 to a Sony A700 while the prices are cheap but I know the main thing I would lose is Live View.
Personally the only times I ever use Live View are if I'm in the flat messing around with something or maybe if I'm out in the street shooting and I don't want it to be obvious that I'm shooting.
Aside from that I don't actually like using it as it seems to eat the battery life on the Sony and 95% of the time I just use the view finder.
The other thing is that I find the LCD very hard to see when its bright outside anyway and its also very low res.
Was just wondering what others use Live View for and maybe if anyones gone from a Live View to non-Live View camera, did it take time to adjust?

Cheers

Chris
 
chrism_scotland said:
I'm currently weighting up upgrading my Sony A300 to a Sony A700 while the prices are cheap but I know the main thing I would lose is Live View.
Personally the only times I ever use Live View are if I'm in the flat messing around with something or maybe if I'm out in the street shooting and I don't want it to be obvious that I'm shooting.
Aside from that I don't actually like using it as it seems to eat the battery life on the Sony and 95% of the time I just use the view finder.
The other thing is that I find the LCD very hard to see when its bright outside anyway and its also very low res.
Was just wondering what others use Live View for and maybe if anyones gone from a Live View to non-Live View camera, did it take time to adjust?

Cheers

Chris
Click to expand...

The only thing I have used live view for is manual focussing on tripod mounted macro shots - zoom in to 10x and then focus, far better than can be achieved through the viewfinder (at least with my eyes!).

Managed without it before though - but was getting annoyed at the soft macros, so I guess it is an improvement.
 
Funny that you should mention this. I too have never been very reliant on the Live View function, but I found it really useful this weekend :).

I was photographing a couple with a 6 month old child and in the time that we spent chatting prior to the shoot, the child couldn't keep his eyes off me (being a stranger, I suppose that I was somehow "interesting") ;). But, when we came to start taking the pictures and I disappeared behind the viewfinder of my D700, he couldn't see my face any more and immediatley started looking elsewhere :|.

As soon as I took the camera down from my face and got his attention again, he would stare and (occasionally) smile at me without looking away ... until 2 seconds after the camera went up again and then he'd just lose interest.

Live View to the rescue :D!

As soon as switched to Live View, I could (roughly) compose the shots and keep Jr.'s attention, thereby managing to get enough usable shots, before everyone got tired with the whole thing. So, it seems that it does have it's uses after all :)!
 
I use mine for macro shots as this helps with the focus. I will often use it when I want to specifically compose a shot, such as in the lightbox, using a tripod. Then I can fiddle with composition and Dof to get something resembling what I want.

Also used for tripod landscape shots. It's a great way to more easily nail that focus in my experience.
 
Never owned LV on a dSLR, never needed it.

For accurate focus with macro, I've found the viewfinder + anglefinder (good quality with magnification) all that I need.

I did had LV on my 'Bridge camera' (and obviously compacts), but didn't miss that all when I moved to a dSLR.

BTW, your LV implementation doesn't give you at the moment what is being described with macro, since the Sony uses a second lower quality sensor for LV (so that you get 'normal' AF)
 
I've not used it yet on my 40D, never had it before and never missed it! but I can see (posts above) the benifits for certain situations and will give them a try (y)
 
I was very dismissive of Live View - until I discovered my 40D already had it, and I tried it.

I always use it now when framing and focusing on a tripod, if I can, though it's not always possible.

Live View be a key function of my next camera, with good AF and a brighter, sharper screen :)
 
corbystock said:
I have heard it can be useful for checking white ballance when shooting jpeg. Only had a quick play with it on the D90 but the AF took too long so not used it since.
Click to expand...


It is, on the D90 anyway just switch it on and adjust your white balance you will see it change in the display screen and there you have it a near perfect white balance setting. (y)
 
should see some of the nightclub photographers I come across in london for a certain website.

I swear they use live view so much they might aswell be using a video camera :D

When I did some rig shots with a friend the live view was quite useful for checking it wasnt ****ed, obviously the camera hanging upside down made normal viewing a touch difficult.
 
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