The Amazing Sony A1/A7/A9/APS-C & Anything else welcome Mega Thread!

addicknchips said:
This is my main issue. Thanks to all who suggested setting it to to tight. It’s made a difference. However I plan to use this type of lens for our upcoming trips to the Peak District and Wales where we will be doing a lot of hiking. If it starts extending while it’s on my hip that’s going to annoy the hell out of me.
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I'm considering getting a bag like these to 'resolve' the issue, this way the camera's on my hip ready to use as and when but it won't extend whilst walking and won't put any stress on the lens mount either. Not a perfect solution but I've started using bags more than my peak design slide recently as I find they swing about less. I think the think tank might be the better option as it should be large enough to take the lens with lens hood attached in the 'shooting position'.

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Raymond Lin said:
fTcpHa0.jpg


9rOEkhx.jpg


(Yes I know it focused on the nose!)
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Second photo is great, Raymond. Really well composed showing the couple in the background and the adorable and hilarious expression from the dog. :)
 
snerkler said:
I'm considering getting a bag like these to 'resolve' the issue, this way the camera's on my hip ready to use as and when but it won't extend whilst walking and won't put any stress on the lens mount either. Not a perfect solution but I've started using bags more than my peak design slide recently as I find they swing about less. I think the think tank might be the better option as it should be large enough to take the lens with lens hood attached in the 'shooting position'.

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Buy THINK TANK Digital Holster 30 V2 Messenger Bag, 75 cm, Black (Negro). Free delivery and returns on eligible orders.
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I wonder if the padded case could be used somehow? obviously it wouldn't be water proof though.
 
addicknchips said:
I wonder if the padded case could be used somehow? obviously it wouldn't be water proof though.
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Only if you don't mind the camera sticking out of the top (y)
 
addicknchips said:
ah yes, stupid of me!

im hugely impressed with the lens and don't think its a deal breaker. something like what you've suggested may be ideal.
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I think the IQ is superb, I'm very happy with mine. Would be better if it was 300g or so lighter but you can't have everything ;)
 
addicknchips said:
damn -have been looking for one but couldn't get one. just ordered a7riv a.
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That's a shame as in the deal with the A9 will be two Sandisk 64GB cards and one of my Peak Design Sling straps, just having a look for prices on Google second hand as it will be a great deal for under 250 Shutter Count.
 
Has anyone else had issues with the Tamron site? I'm trying to check if my 70-180mm is one of those affected by the floating element issue (although I doubt it as it's brand new), and also trying to get onto the lens update page, but this isn't working and neither is the page to check the serial number. I've tried chrome and safari browsers
 
snerkler said:
Has anyone else had issues with the Tamron site? I'm trying to check if my 70-180mm is one of those affected by the floating element issue (although I doubt it as it's brand new), and also trying to get onto the lens update page, but this isn't working and neither is the page to check the serial number. I've tried chrome and safari browsers
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the serial checker is working for me.
 
woof woof said:
Just some flowers from todays walk to the shops.

Sony A7, Voigtlander 35mm f1.4 and No.4 close up filter.

CQ3XjgD.jpg


8ivvWZ1.jpg
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What's a close up filter?
 
Merlin5 said:
What's a close up filter?
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It's just a magnifying lens that screws onto the end of your lens like a filter does. They often come in sets, 1, 2, 4... and can be stacked. They allow you to focus closer but you lose the ability to focus at greater distances, until you take the filter off again :D They're not as good as a macro lens but I'm happy enough with the quality and I like to use one and I do quite often.

Also, some lenses are not at their best at minimum focus distance and as using a close up filter may involve the lens not being at its close focus distance the image quality can be improved.
 
Stephen L said:
It’s not technically a filter
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I agree with you on that one to a certain extent, but I have a set of "Hoya" units and on each individual container it clearly states close up filter as it does on the edge of each unit. I think maybe a better interpretation would be close up attachment.
 
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Merlin5 said:
What's a close up filter?
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Lee, the single element units etc are not too bad but if you were figuring on getting better quality shots ie less distortion & sharper images it might be a good idea for you to give the "Raynox" series a look. They are more expensive but far better optically.
 
Stephen L said:
It’s not technically a filter, but a lens fitted to the front of the camera lens to allow it to focus closer at the expense of distant focus
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woof woof said:
It's just a magnifying lens that screws onto the end of your lens like a filter does. They often come in sets, 1, 2, 4... and can be stacked. They allow you to focus closer but you lose the ability to focus at greater distances, until you take the filter off again :D They're not as good as a macro lens but I'm happy enough with the quality and I like to use one and I do quite often.

Also, some lenses are not at their best at minimum focus distance and as using a close up filter may involve the lens not being at its close focus distance the image quality can be improved.
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G.K.Jnr. said:
Lee, the single element units etc are not too bad but if you were figuring on getting better quality shots ie less distortion & sharper images it might be a good idea for you to give the "Raynox" series a look. They are more expensive but far better optically.
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Thanks guys, now I know what a close up filter is. :)
 
I was just watching a Mark Galer tutorial on Sony exposure metering modes (multi, spot, highlight, etc) and he said they're all basically disabled when shooting in manual mode apart from being able to use +/- exposure compensation. I didn't know that. I shoot manual pretty much exclusively, I rarely use aperture priority. So does that mean it really won't matter what my metering mode is set to and won't have changed anything when I've occasionally switched from multi to spot in manual mode?
 
Merlin5 said:
I was just watching a Mark Galer tutorial on Sony exposure metering modes (multi, spot, highlight, etc) and he said they're all basically disabled when shooting in manual mode apart from being able to use +/- exposure compensation. I didn't know that. I shoot manual pretty much exclusively, I rarely use aperture priority. So does that mean it really won't matter what my metering mode is set to and won't have changed anything when I've occasionally switched from multi to spot in manual mode?
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That doesn’t make sense to me, you still need to meter correctly to know the ‘correct’ exposure. You can’t choose your settings blindly and I don’t think Sony would expect you to know the Sunny 16 rule ;)
 
Merlin5 said:
I was just watching a Mark Galer tutorial on Sony exposure metering modes (multi, spot, highlight, etc) and he said they're all basically disabled when shooting in manual mode apart from being able to use +/- exposure compensation. I didn't know that. I shoot manual pretty much exclusively, I rarely use aperture priority. So does that mean it really won't matter what my metering mode is set to and won't have changed anything when I've occasionally switched from multi to spot in manual mode?
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You just beat me to it Toby, I personally can see no point in having exposure compensation when shooting in manual mode. All it would do is alter something you've set manually in the first place. Maybe dial in a bit of exposure compensation for fill in flash if using it but that's all.
 
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G.K.Jnr. said:
I personally can see no point in having exposure compensation when shooting in manual mode. All it would do is alter something you've set manually in the first place.
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If you are shooting fully manual then it'll actually have no affect.
But if are shooting in A/S or M with auto-ISO then it'll have affect.

Merlin5 said:
I was just watching a Mark Galer tutorial on Sony exposure metering modes (multi, spot, highlight, etc) and he said they're all basically disabled when shooting in manual mode apart from being able to use +/- exposure compensation. I didn't know that. I shoot manual pretty much exclusively, I rarely use aperture priority. So does that mean it really won't matter what my metering mode is set to and won't have changed anything when I've occasionally switched from multi to spot in manual mode?
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That's kinda correct. metering is largely inconsequential in fully manual model from the camera perspective as you are fully controlling all the exposure parameters.
But it does help from the point view of getting exposure reading on the exposure better at the bottom of your screen/EVF. It's helpful especially in highly dynamic scenes or in unevenly lit subjects or when you are exposing the certain parts of the images.
While you have WYSIWYG with the live view it's still helpful to know the meter reading to give me an idea on how I'll process the image later.
 
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G.K.Jnr. said:
You just beat me to it Toby, I personally can see no point in having exposure compensation when shooting in manual mode. All it would do is alter something you've set manually in the first place. Maybe dial in a bit of exposure compensation for fill in flash if using it but that's all.
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The only time I can see exp comp being useful in manual mode is using auto ISO, but then you could argue that's not truly manual mode ;)
 
nandbytes said:
That's kinda correct. metering is largely inconsequential in fully manual model from the camera perspective as you are fully controlling all the exposure parameters.
But it does help from the point view of getting exposure reading on the exposure better at the bottom of your screen. It's helpful especially in highly dynamic scenes or in unevenly lit subjects or when you are exposing the certain parts of the images.
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I would kind of disagree with this as you use the metering to base your exposure parameters. If you don't meter you have nothing to base the exposure parameters on therefore metering is vital imo, unless you go back to the Sunny 16 rule or you're one of the old school folk who just know from experience what the exposure should be.
 
snerkler said:
I would kind of disagree with this as you use the metering to base your exposure parameters. If you don't meter you have nothing to base the exposure parameters on therefore metering is vital imo, unless you go back to the Sunny 16 rule or you're one of the old school folk who just know from experience what the exposure should be.
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I didn't say any different, read the rest of my message ;)
That what I meant by it being helpful for dynamic scenes or unevenly lit scenes.
As far as camera is concerned there is no consequence as it won't act or change anything based on meter reading.
Plus I'm slightly old school too but I haven't commented on that.
 
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nandbytes said:
I didn't say any different, read the rest of my message ;)
That what I meant by it being helpful for dynamic scenes or unevenly lit scenes.
As far as camera is concerned there is no consequence as it won't act or change anything based on meter reading.
Plus I'm slightly old school too but I haven't commented on that.
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I did read it :p
 
Thanks guys. So just to be clear, I keep my top mode dial to manual. So I'm manually controlling my aperture and shutter speed. However I almost exclusively use auto ISO so as George said, I'm not fully manual.

I then monitor my exposure meter in the EVF and usually adjust my shutter speed until the meter is centred for correct exposure, and if I remember to look, I'll check my histogram too. So with that all done, changing the camera's metering from say multi to spot, highlight or centre weighted won't alter my histogram and EVF exposure meter since my mode dial is in manual, is that right?
 
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Merlin5 said:
Thanks guys. So just to be clear, I keep my top mode dial to manual. So I'm manually controlling my aperture and shutter speed. However I almost exclusively use auto ISO so as George said, I'm not fully manual.

I then monitor my exposure meter in the EVF and usually adjust my shutter speed until the meter is centred for correct exposure, and if I remember to look, I'll check my histogram too. So with that all done, changing the camera's metering from say multi to spot, highlight or centre weighted won't alter my histogram and EVF exposure meter since my mode dial is in manual, is that right?
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what your exposure meter shows is always dependant on your metering and your chosen exposure (or camera's chose exposure if you have auto-something).
The histogram isn't that's a representation of the scene.
 
Merlin5 said:
Thanks guys. So just to be clear, I keep my top mode dial to manual. So I'm manually controlling my aperture and shutter speed. However I almost exclusively use auto ISO so as George said, I'm not fully manual.

I then monitor my exposure meter in the EVF and usually adjust my shutter speed until the meter is centred for correct exposure, and if I remember to look, I'll check my histogram too. So with that all done, changing the camera's metering from say multi to spot, highlight or centre weighted won't alter my histogram and EVF exposure meter since my mode dial is in manual, is that right?
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If you have auto ISO then changing the metering may very well change the ISO value, and therefore change what you see in the EVF and histogram. The only way to guarantee exposure won’t change is to use manual everything in terms of exposure parameters or use AEL.
 
nandbytes said:
what your exposure meter shows is always dependant on your metering and your chosen exposure (or camera's chose exposure if you have auto-something).
The histogram isn't that's a representation of the scene.
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Just to add, the histogram represents the scene based on your exposure settings, so will change if you change the exposure settings (y)
 
I use aperture and manual both with auto ISO and I've never noticed spot metering not working. In fact I used manual with auto ISO and spot today and it seemed to work fine.

I think manual with auto ISO and exposure compensation is wonderful as I'd typically want to set my aperture and shutter speed whilst leaving the camera to set the ISO as if the camera does it that's one less thing for me to do but with the ability to brighten the scene with exposure compensation. Wonderful :D I'd hate to be without all that now. Actually a lot of the time exposure compensation may not be necessary as you can often boost it post capture and even boost it on only selected parts of the picture without it all falling apart.
 
woof woof said:
I use aperture and manual both with auto ISO and I've never noticed spot metering not working. In fact I used manual with auto ISO and spot today and it seemed to work fine.

I think manual with auto ISO and exposure compensation is wonderful as I'd typically want to set my aperture and shutter speed whilst leaving the camera to set the ISO as if the camera does it that's one less thing for me to do but with the ability to brighten the scene with exposure compensation. Wonderful :D I'd hate to be without all that now. Actually a lot of the time exposure compensation may not be necessary as you can often boost it post capture and even boost it on only selected parts of the picture without it all falling apart.
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Yeah, I don't think I've used exposure compensation yet. This is the video I watched and if you skip to 31:43, he mentions about metering modes in manual.

View: https://youtu.be/9pV7zX0qC7Q
 
Merlin5 said:
Thanks guys. So just to be clear, I keep my top mode dial to manual. So I'm manually controlling my aperture and shutter speed. However I almost exclusively use auto ISO so as George said, I'm not fully manual.

I then monitor my exposure meter in the EVF and usually adjust my shutter speed until the meter is centred for correct exposure, and if I remember to look, I'll check my histogram too. So with that all done, changing the camera's metering from say multi to spot, highlight or centre weighted won't alter my histogram and EVF exposure meter since my mode dial is in manual, is that right?
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Lee, you're histogram is not metering as such it's just indicating the distribution of dark to light tones.

As for metering modes I'll give you an example, if you were taking a shot of a performer on stage with the overall scene lit by stage lighting but with a spot light on the performer and you used multi metering the performers face would almost certainly burnt out but the overall exposure for the scene would be correct. In this case the histogram would show perhaps an even distribution of tones with just a small spike to the right of the graph. If you were to change your metering mode to spot metering and metered of the performers face the face would then not be burnt out but the rest of the scene would be very dark and your histogram would show the bulk of tones to the left of the graph but the exposure for the main subject would be correct. Hope that all make sense.
 
Exposure compensation always does the same thing - it provides an offset from the metered exposure.
In auto / semi auto / manual with auto ISO this means the camera will make adjustments to the settings to bring the exposure to this 'modified' zero.
In 'full auto' it will still adjust the metering - so if you are shooting a scene you know the camera will get the exposure wrong, and have a number of shots to take, it might be simpler to set the relevant exposure compensation so that when adjusting settings yourself you have a base target of 0, as that is usually easier to see than -1 1/3, for example.
 
G.K.Jnr. said:
Lee, you're histogram is not metering as such it's just indicating the distribution of dark to light tones.

As for metering modes I'll give you an example, if you were taking a shot of a performer on stage with the overall scene lit by stage lighting but with a spot light on the performer and you used multi metering the performers face would almost certainly burnt out but the overall exposure for the scene would be correct. In this case the histogram would show perhaps an even distribution of tones with just a small spike to the right of the graph. If you were to change your metering mode to spot metering and metered of the performers face the face would then not be burnt out but the rest of the scene would be very dark and your histogram would show the bulk of tones to the left of the graph but the exposure for the main subject would be correct. Hope that all make sense.
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Thanks George, yes, all makes sense. But according to that video, metering modes like multi and spot are disabled when using manual. But since I use auto ISO with manual mode and therefore not fully manual, does that mean multi and spot metering modes are enabled, or are you referring to being in aperture or shutter priority only? Apologies for my confusion on this.
 
G.K.Jnr. said:
The way I see it is if you're using auto ISO then you're not shooting manual.
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I hear this said so often and know its not really full manual control, but what do you call it if you're using M mode with auto ISO? Surely its 'manual with auto iso enabled'. What else could it be called?

M mode and auto ISO is so useful for genres like wildlife when cameras have such a good ISO performance. I find it so useful so I can choose the aperture and shutter speed and not worry too much about ISO. Like woof woof has said exposure compensation is useful in M mode with auto iso as it overrides the ISO value the camera has chosen. Of course I could just turn off auto ISO but often the light can be changeable with wildlife and I'd probably not be able to keep up.

What I've never understood is the people who use full manual mode and just centre the camera's meter. Just seems pointless to me is you're basing the manual exposure values you select off the cameras metering you may as well just use aperture priority or shutter priority.
 
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