light metering on Canon 350d

[Cactussed]

Guys

Upgraded from an old D60 to a 350D (a few months back, then got v busy). Since then, a LOT of my shots are coming out over blown. Having to wind back by a few stops to get them acceptable, and even then not overly happy with the results.

Any thoughts? Should I be changing the metering setting?

To be fair, I prob need to spend an hour just shooting with all the diff settings but any pointers appreciated.

Andrew

[Simpo Two]

I'm not familiar with Canon but on general pointers, what is your ISO set to? What exposure mode are you using? EV should be 0.



ETA: I'll put 50p on 'manual metering'

Edited by Simpo Two on Thursday 14th August 12:26

[Cactussed]

No, tried shooting in full auto all the way through to manual. Shhoting so the EV is at zero, I still get (to my mind) overblown shots. Same goes for ISO from 100 all the way through (up to about 800, not bothered beyond that).

As I said, seems to work best when I shoot and set up to be 1/3 to 2/3 of a stop below zero. Only thing I can think of is metering (and maybe I should just stick to spot rather than evaluative or weighted average or whatever it is).

[ehasler]

What does the histogram say? If you're not showing any blown hightlights on the histogram, it might just be your monitor that needs tweaking.

Would offer to have a look over a drink, but you know you'd just end up with whisky all over it

[Cactussed]

ehasler said:

What does the histogram say? If you're not showing any blown hightlights on the histogram, it might just be your monitor that needs tweaking.

Would offer to have a look over a drink, but you know you'd just end up with whisky all over it

V funny. Hey, heard the Tiv had a moment again??? WTF??

[ehasler]

Cactussed said:

ehasler said:

What does the histogram say? If you're not showing any blown hightlights on the histogram, it might just be your monitor that needs tweaking.

Would offer to have a look over a drink, but you know you'd just end up with whisky all over it

V funny. Hey, heard the Tiv had a moment again??? WTF??

Yeah, engine died again in June, had "issues" with the garage that did the rebuild 6 months previously so had the car moved to TVR Power last week, only for this to happen...

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

[DIW35]

Have you tried a different lens? One of my old lenses suffered diaphragm failure, and wouldn't stop down to the set aperture, resulting in overexposed piccies.

[Stigmundfreud]

have you made sure you havent cack handedly whacked the exposure bias up a stop or 2?

[RobDickinson]

I typicaly shoot at -1/3rd EV on exp comp with my 350d, I do find it does tend to over expose.

But check what meetering mode your using and what your shooting, could make a big difference.

[Stigmundfreud]

I'm a bit amazed people suggest the 350d overexposes, it was renound for its metering and certainly never had any issues with it

[Cactussed]

ehasler said:

Yeah, engine died again in June, had "issues" with the garage that did the rebuild 6 months previously so had the car moved to TVR Power last week, only for this to happen...

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

Doh! Oh well. At least it's still in one piece...

[Cactussed]

DIW35 said:

Have you tried a different lens? One of my old lenses suffered diaphragm failure, and wouldn't stop down to the set aperture, resulting in overexposed piccies.

Yeah, I swapped back to the old D60 and all was well so lens seems OK.
I am 99% certain it is me being cack-handed somehow, just not sure wtf I am doing wrong. As I said, need to spend a little time playing with it.

[ehasler]

What do the histograms show when you view the images on a PC? If it is over exposing, the graph will be over to the right with burnt out highlights.