Hi everyone,

So before my trip across the pond to LHR and MAN next week, I want to try to tweak my spotting settings on my camera.

Back in December when I went to LAX, I was on aperture priority at f9, and my photos suffered from chronic overexposure. I'm wondering if I should adjust my exposure compensation to decrease this overexposure or just switch to manual mode and adjust the shutter speed myself.

Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks!
Amrit

What I usually do is adjust the exposure compensation then play with it for a while and find a suitable setting. I always use aperture priority at f8 while spotting.

Cheers,
Yang Qize

What metering mode are you using? Do you find your camera overexposes all the time or only under certain conditions? EC can be a good quick adjustment if you find your camera meters scenes too bright or too dark consistently, but you should also try to find out why that might happen.

Quoting YQZ380 (Reply 1): I always use aperture priority at f8 while spotting.

Not sure what to say to this other than you are missing out on lots of other photography methods.
-Matt

This:

Quoting kann123air (Thread starter): switch to manual mode and adjust the shutter speed myself.

It's not nearly as intimidating as it sounds (or at least, as I thought it was going to be). By selecting aperture, ISO, and exposure compensation, you're basically 2/3 of the way there.

Quoting waketurbulence (Reply 2): Not sure what to say to this other than you are missing out on lots of other photography methods.

Maybe I should have phrased it better; I use it for the majority of my shots 

I've been to f/4 a few times while shooting on a moving plane at night and f20 once for long exposures. But I've been using f8 for most of my pictures shot in daylight. Hopefully I can pick up more methods and use a wider range of f values as I go along.

Hello Amrit,
As far I know you are a Nikon guy and you probably know that Nikon cameras tend to overexpose on a sunny bright day.
Usually I use exposure compensation down to -0.3 and sometimes -0.7 [winter time] when sun reflected from the snow and exposure needs more correction. Every situation is different so play a bit with your camera.

Hope LHR and MAN will treat you with good light  
Enjoy spotting there!

Getting good exposure means understanding Light, Reflectivity, and the interaction between shutter speed and aperture.

This is what you should do.

1) Get a good Incident Light meter.
2) Use an 18% Grey Card
3) Understand Histograms.
4) Read, read, read and learn!!!

I could tell you that right where I am now, with the lighting I have now, it's ASA 200, F:2.8 @ 1/125 sec.
But what the hell does that really tell you? Your light is different wherever you are. There is no magical "setting" for a camera to get good photos. There is only light and the capture of that light. You need to measure it, understand it, then use it for the purpose you intend at that precise moment.

Only learning is the true way to consistently get good exposure. There is no magic answer.

Quoting waketurbulence (Reply 2): What metering mode are you using?

I honestly don't know. I haven't changed it, so I assume it's still in the setting it comes with. I would check, but it's in for a sensor cleaning now.

Quoting waketurbulence (Reply 2): Do you find your camera overexposes all the time or only under certain conditions?

I would say under broad, midday light. Golden light situations seem to be okay.

Quoting vikkyvik (Reply 3): It's not nearly as intimidating as it sounds (or at least, as I thought it was going to be). By selecting aperture, ISO, and exposure compensation, you're basically 2/3 of the way there.

I think I might just do this. I need to start doing that some time, so it might as well be next week!

Quoting yerbol (Reply 5): Usually I use exposure compensation down to -0.3 and sometimes -0.7 [winter time] when sun reflected from the snow and exposure needs more correction. Every situation is different so play a bit with your camera.

This is tempting too. I might go out to FSM before the LHR/MAN trip and try out the full manual vs this method and see which one seems to work better for me.

Quoting photopilot (Reply 6): Only learning is the true way to consistently get good exposure. There is no magic answer.

Sounds good, I'll keep working at it.  

Thanks for the replies!
Amrit

Quoting YQZ380 (Reply 1): What I usually do is adjust the exposure compensation then play with it for a while and find a suitable setting. I always use aperture priority at f8 while spotting.

What I don't understand is why people are ok with setting aperture and ISO and bouncing around the exposure compensation dial in aperture priority, when instead they could as easily set aperture, ISO and shutter speed in manual mode. Like Vik said, you're already 2/3 of the way there. Why tell the camera to choose a different shutter speed when you could just set it yourself? Cut out the middle man! There's also the added benefit of better consistency from shot to shot.

[Edited 2015-06-22 18:57:42]

Quoting Silver1SWA (Reply 8): Cut out the middle man! There's also the added benefit of better consistency from shot to shot.

Good point, and well said. I think I'll do just that.

Amrit

Quoting kann123air (Reply 9): Quoting Silver1SWA (Reply 8): Cut out the middle man! There's also the added benefit of better consistency from shot to shot. Good point, and well said. I think I'll do just that.

Do it!

The only times that manual mode can be a bit of a pain is when there are low, patchy, fast-moving clouds (basically, LA's marine layer). A couple weekends ago, I was out on that sort of evening, and it was a bit challenging, as a single airplane would travel in and out of the sun over a few thousand horizontal feet.

But if you're smart, and pick where you want to shoot it a few seconds ahead of time, it's not really a problem (I tend not to be so smart). And it's a fun challenge.

Quoting photopilot (Reply 6): Getting good exposure means understanding Light, Reflectivity, and the interaction between shutter speed and aperture. This is what you should do. 1) Get a good Incident Light meter. 2) Use an 18% Grey Card 3) Understand Histograms. 4) Read, read, read and learn!!!

Preach! I also like to use the recover function in Camera Raw.

Quoting Silver1SWA (Reply 8): What I don't understand is why people are ok with setting aperture and ISO and bouncing around the exposure compensation dial in aperture priority, when instead they could as easily set aperture, ISO and shutter speed in manual mode. Like Vik said, you're already 2/3 of the way there. Why tell the camera to choose a different shutter speed when you could just set it yourself? Cut out the middle man!

Because it'll always give you a consistent exposure within the parameters you set.

Manual is fine for everyday shooting, but when it comes to moving subjects and changing light, Your exposure can wander a great deal from nominal.

Quoting sulman (Reply 12): Because it'll always give you a consistent exposure within the parameters you set.

In maybe 6 months or so of using aperture priority, there was one absolute certainty: it would not always give me a consistent exposure.

My exposures are more consistent with manual.

Quoting vikkyvik (Reply 13): Quoting sulman (Reply 12): Because it'll always give you a consistent exposure within the parameters you set. In maybe 6 months or so of using aperture priority, there was one absolute certainty: it would not always give me a consistent exposure. My exposures are more consistent with manual.

This is my experience as well. Unless you're tracking an aircraft nearly 180 degrees from being front lit to back lit, it's not a big problem. I generally have a particular scene I try to capture and focus on getting the subject when it enters that frame.

Semi-auto modes can sometimes give significantly different settings and exposures because the camera can be tricked.

Anyway, there's nothing wrong with using TV or AV modes. My point was if you have to bounce around the exposure compensation dial to find good exposure, you can just as effectively bounce around the shutter speed dial and find something that will work from shot to shot.

Quoting Silver1SWA (Reply 14): My point was if you have to bounce around the exposure compensation dial to find good exposure, you can just as effectively bounce around the shutter speed dial and find something that will work from shot to shot.

  

I would definitely NOT recommend shooting in Manual mode. Manual mode is for situations where the lighting is controlled, or at least not subject to changing to where you wouldn't be able to readjust your settings to account for the changed lighting. Once that plane has gone by, its gone by...so stick with aperture priority and use center weighted metering to make sure the aircraft are being exposed correctly.

Quoting megatop412 (Reply 16): I would definitely NOT recommend shooting in Manual mode. Manual mode is for situations where the lighting is controlled, or at least not subject to changing to where you wouldn't be able to readjust your settings to account for the changed lighting. Once that plane has gone by, its gone by...so stick with aperture priority and use center weighted metering to make sure the aircraft are being exposed correctly.

Oh please... Lighting doesn't change that fast unless you have some partly cloudy skies and the sun is in and out of clouds every minute or so.

Manual is fine. Aperture priority is fine. Use what you want.

Quoting Silver1SWA (Reply 14): This is my experience as well. Unless you're tracking an aircraft nearly 180 degrees

The particular case I'm thinking of is panning when a background transitions from sky to ground features - it can be a couple of stops difference in a small arc.

Photopilot's answer is the only really accurate one here though in practical terms Megatop12 is close to the mark.

I cannot understand why people talk about manual exposures as though it is some sort of holy grail. Many years ago we used to get a rough guide on a piece of paper included with the film saying that in bright light, 1/125 at F8 was a rough guide. That was a true manual exposure, guesswork and it served me reasonably until I bought, first an exposure meter and later a camera with a built in meter. Since then camera manufacturers and light meter manufacturers have spent decades fine tuning exposure meters so why not use them ? It is important to understand when they are likely to fail but a centre weighted exposure meter is going to give good results most of the time.

However I realise that I am out of step with most people here in that I generally use shutter speed priority.

I take a lot of prop aircraft and I hate to see frozen props so it is important for me to keep shutter speeds as low as I can for good blur. Whilst all lenses work best stopped down a bit, it is unusual to see an aircraft photograph spoiled by using the wrong aperture but get the wrong shutter speed and it is all too easy to lose the shot. The difference between F8 and F5.6 for most lenses is going to be a more academic one than one that will be seen in day to day use, but the difference between 1/500 and 1/250 shutter speed can be dramatic, especially with a long lens. The only time I use aperture priority is when I am working slowly with the camera on a tripod when I use F8 or F11 as it does not then matter if the exposure is 1 or 2 seconds, but the extra depth of field is useful

Quoting photopilot (Reply 6): Getting good exposure means understanding Light, Reflectivity, and the interaction between shutter speed and aperture.

Re-read that - it is the best advice in this thread !

Mick Bajcar

I'm with you Mick - unless you're shooting close up the impact of aperture (ie DOF) on the image is going to be small compared to variations shutter speed can bring.

I tend to use shutter priority for aviation and sailing (getting prop blur or frozen water droplets is all important in my book), and aperture priority situations where I'm using wide angle

Just to add to the whole exposure thing - I've found the EVF on my Oly EM-1 to be a game changer - you can set it up to show a histogram in real time or "blinkies" for over/under exposed areas. Manual/auto exposure is almost irrelevant with this setup. I now tend to use auto modes as a "safety" eg. to ensure I don't exceed or drop below a certain speed.

Cheers,

Colin

I must be missing something here, because IMO as long as you shoot RAW then your exposure mode is almost irrelevant.

Okay, on a part-cloudy day you can have an aircraft popping in and out of sunrays multiple times as it blasts along a mile of runway, but your shots will rarely end up so badly exposed that they can’t be fixed by moving the sliders on ACR. Even when you’ve locked in the exposure using manual mode.

If that does happen, you also have the option of experimenting with spot metering rather than matrix, which I would guess is what the OP is using.

Quoting dendrobatid (Reply 19): cannot understand why people talk about manual exposures as though it is some sort of holy grail.

Manual mode is not some holy grail, but it's not as scary as many photographers make it out to be. For the third time I'll emphasize my point...or heck, I'll just copy and paste from above...

Anyway, there's nothing wrong with using TV or AV modes. My point was if you have to bounce around the exposure compensation dial to find good exposure, you can just as effectively bounce around the shutter speed dial and find something that will work from shot to shot.

Since I didn't explicitly state it, I'll go ahead and agree with the following:

Quoting Silver1SWA (Reply 14): Anyway, there's nothing wrong with using TV or AV modes.

  

Quoting Silver1SWA (Reply 17): Manual is fine. Aperture priority is fine. Use what you want.

  

That aside...

Quoting sulman (Reply 18): The particular case I'm thinking of is panning when a background transitions from sky to ground features - it can be a couple of stops difference in a small arc.

I almost never have to change my exposure more than 1/3 of a stop when an airplane taking off goes from ground background to sky background. Sometimes I don't have to change it at all. On a clear day with the airplane front lit, it's pretty much the same.

That changes if it's overcast, or the aircraft is backlit.

Quoting dendrobatid (Reply 19): I cannot understand why people talk about manual exposures as though it is some sort of holy grail.

To be fair, no one here did.

Quoting dendrobatid (Reply 19): Since then camera manufacturers and light meter manufacturers have spent decades fine tuning exposure meters so why not use them ?

Agree, and I use my light meter as a rough starting-point on a given day.

Quoting dendrobatid (Reply 19): it is unusual to see an aircraft photograph spoiled by using the wrong aperture but get the wrong shutter speed and it is all too easy to lose the shot.

      

Quoting snddim01 (Reply 21): Okay, on a part-cloudy day you can have an aircraft popping in and out of sunrays multiple times as it blasts along a mile of runway, but your shots will rarely end up so badly exposed that they can’t be fixed by moving the sliders on ACR. Even when you’ve locked in the exposure using manual mode.

Oh, absolutely. I've easily "rescued" shots that were underexposed by over a stop. It's not really an issue.

Quoting vikkyvik (Reply 23): I almost never have to change my exposure more than 1/3 of a stop when an airplane taking off goes from ground background to sky background. Sometimes I don't have to change it at all. On a clear day with the airplane front lit, it's pretty much the same.

Well no, you shouldn't have to - assuming the same light is falling on the aircraft; but of course this is where a metering system can let you down (unless you're using partial or spot) because the overall scene gets brighter - the sky can influence the meter and cause it to reduce the exposure. Meters don't know the subject of interest is the aircraft. And this is where manual metering can be an advantage.

But it is also true that a pan of an aircraft moving along the runway can change from shooting towards the sun (backlit) to away from the sun - a range of 2 or 3 stops may be required if you were shooting the whole sequence.

In short, there is no magic formula or "recommended setting" for any situation. The key is to understand how your meter works, when it can be fooled and be prepared to adapt.

It's also worth considering what constitutes the "perfect" exposure. In the case of jpg you want to record the scene as accurately as possible from white to black without losing highlight or shadow detail - you want to minimise the amount of post processing required as it will, to some extent, degrade image quality.

With RAW things are a bit different. The nature of digital recording means that the maximum image data is contained in the highlights - the brighter the tones, the better the signal to noise ratio at the point of recording. Hence the "expose to the right" mantra.

Unlike jpgs, RAW allows us to remap the tones without degradation. So ideally, you want to record the image as bright as possible without blowing meaningful highlights. This could mean that the original looks overexposed ... eg. blacks are recorded as grey. But when you adjust this in RAW conversion, you remap the shadows so that the dark greys become black. The advantage is that now your deep shadows contain more real data and less noise.

Cheers,

Colin

Quoting snddim01 (Reply 21): I must be missing something here, because IMO as long as you shoot RAW then your exposure mode is almost irrelevant.

And what happens if the client or in my case my employer want and NEEDS film. Your whole RAW argument goes right out the window.

Here's an example.


View Large View Medium

Photo © Stephen Liard


Our marketing department wanted the above photo shot on 2-1/2 inch film transparency. We were using Hasselblad 500CM bodies with a 150mm T* Sonnar/Zeiss lens. Film was Fuji RVP50. It was shot from the tail-turret of a B-25 Mitchell (Old Glory) which cost us $7,000 per hour to rent and including ferry time was needed for 7 hours. So you're blowing a nick shy of $50K dollars on a photo shoot. In addition, a sub-supplier ( Dowty Propellers ) wants the image to clearly show prop blur AND yet still be able to identify that it's a six-bladed design.

Oh, and you don't have infinite shutter speeds. You have the good old standbys of 1/30, 1/60, 1/125, 1/250 etc. and either full or 1/2 aperatures only. (That's the way Blad lenses are designed) And there's no light meter in the camera. No TV or EV or compensation dial and no way to preview a shot after it's taken. (Wait days till it's processed, and run clip-tests to verify before you commit all your film)

So what do you do if you don't understand the mechanics of absolute control of exposure etc? The only advantage we had was that at pre-flight briefing we knew in advance the actual propeller RPM that would be run for the shooting time. With a bit of mathematics you can determine exactly how much prop rotation you want or need in the image and the corresponding shutter speed to use.

Oh, and one final thing. You only get 12 exposures per back or if you're lucky and using 220 film, you get the luxury of 24 exposures per film back.

That's why I preach that if you want to master your craft of photography you need to learn and understand the basics till you have it down pat. Then you can let the electronics assist you. If you can't respect the craft of photography enough to do that then IMHO you're just a button pusher spraying "clicks" and hoping to get something right.

Rant over.

Quoting photopilot (Reply 25): And what happens if the client or in my case my employer want and NEEDS film. Your whole RAW argument goes right out the window.

Let's be fair here. That shot was taken in 1999. It is now 2015. From what I can tell, Canon's first RAW format was released in 1997. I'm not saying some places won't still require film, but a LOT has changed in 16 years.

Also, I'd wager the majority of us aren't taking photos for any sort of marketing department.

So while your treatise was absolutely applicable to you in that situation, it may not be to others.

While I'm certainly not saying people shouldn't learn the basics of exposure and photography, for some there is no need to go as deep as you suggest, especially if you can still attain your personal goals.

Horses for courses, and all that.

That aside, why were you shooting from a B-25?

Quoting ckw (Reply 24): but of course this is where a metering system can let you down (unless you're using partial or spot) because the overall scene gets brighter - the sky can influence the meter and cause it to reduce the exposure. Meters don't know the subject of interest is the aircraft. And this is where manual metering can be an advantage.

That is exactly my experience. I tend to shoot a lot toward sunset, and I would get extremely variable results with aperture priority.

Besides, if I screw up a shot using full manual, I know that I screwed it up, and I know how I screwed it up. I won't be sitting there wondering why the camera didn't do what I wanted it to do.

Quoting photopilot (Reply 25): That's why I preach that if you want to master your craft of photography you need to learn and understand the basics till you have it down pat. Then you can let the electronics assist you. If you can't respect the craft of photography enough to do that then IMHO you're just a button pusher spraying "clicks" and hoping to get something right.

Meh... Too much work when all I need is to know how to use Photoshop to fix a underexposed black image from my D750.  

I'm joking. Excellent post.

Quoting photopilot (Reply 25): That's why I preach that if you want to master your craft of photography you need to learn and understand the basics till you have it down pat. Then you can let the electronics assist you. If you can't respect the craft of photography enough to do that then IMHO you're just a button pusher spraying "clicks" and hoping to get something right.

Spot on - the fact that you can use post processing to "save" an image has lead to people relying on this. But there are no free lunches - a correctly exposed image will always result in higher IQ than one the that been "fixed".

Cheers.

Colin

We all make mistakes with exposure on occasion but understanding what has gone wrong is important and that comes back to what Photopilot said - understand it all !
These days there is a place for 'spray and pray' and I do it myself at times. But it is never due to exposure only because of my obsession with good prop or rotor blur. Adjacent frames can be very different when you are using low shutter speeds due to camera shake, uneven panning or subject movement. It costs nothing to take a few and it is far easier to do that than to get home and wish you had.

I did not strike lucky with just one shot of these aircraft....

View Large View Medium Photo © Mick Bajcar

View Large View Medium Photo © Mick Bajcar

I did however with this !

View Large View Medium

Photo © Mick Bajcar


Mick Bajcar

Quoting vikkyvik (Reply 26): That aside, why were you shooting from a B-25?

The B-25 is an ideal photo platform for air-to-air photography. There really isn't (other than other bombers) any other aircraft that allows you to shoot directly astern, and hold that position for minutes at a time (or however long you need). On commercial shoots like this it is usually a team approach and there was a full video team aboard shooting promo vids at the same time.

Quoting dendrobatid (Reply 29): I did not strike lucky with just one shot of these aircraft....

Great stuff Mick.....   

Thank you everyone for your amazing advice! I will carefully read all your tips and learn from them.

I went out to FSM a few minutes ago and played around with aperture priority/exposure comp and manual. Both seemed to yield similar results, backing up what many of you have said that both are acceptable options.

Quoting photopilot (Reply 25): If you can't respect the craft of photography enough to do that then IMHO you're just a button pusher spraying "clicks" and hoping to get something right.

And a simple button pusher is someone who I don't want to be!  

Amrit

Quoting kann123air (Reply 31): I went out to FSM a few minutes ago and played around with aperture priority/exposure comp and manual. Both seemed to yield similar results, backing up what many of you have said that both are acceptable options.

That was my point! They do yield similar results because they are accomplishing the same thing. Exposure compensation is you telling the camera to increase or decrease exposure. In Aperture Priority that means you're telling the camera how to manipulate the shutter speed. In manual, with those same aperture and ISO settings you just adjust the shutter speed to adjust exposure instead of telling the camera to do that for you. But of course, as discussed above, that works best if your light won't be changing much.

In my opinion, the advantage of getting in the habit of using Manual mode is that you quickly learn how to read the different conditions and know exactly where to start when choosing settings for desired exposure. That's why I'm such a supporter of using Manual, especially for aviation. The ideal conditions for airliners.net photos are not that difficult.

[Edited 2015-06-25 21:21:12]