If you listen to The Digi Show you heard Steph describe learning to shoot in manual mode. Did you hear her mention that little line thingy at the bottom of her viewfinder?
Yes. It has a name. And a lot of information.
Let me introduce you to your Internal Light Meter!
Yep. That’s it’s name. Reading light is its game.
It is always on. It reads the light reflected off of your subject, whatever subject you point it toward.
Pick up your camera and give it a try.
- Start by placing your camera in Manual Mode! (Leave your lens on Auto Focus. It’s M is something different).
- Point your lens toward different colors with different intensities of light, you’ll notice it bounce toward the + side and then -.
- Point it at a bright light. It goes to the + side. It’s reading a lot of light reflecting off your subject, telling you, “I’ve got too much light for this exposure!”
- Point it at a dark subject. It goes to the – side. It’s reading low light from your subject, shouting, “I don’t have enough light for this exposure!”
Understanding how those numbers are moving is the first step to shooting in manual mode.
Simply put, you want the indicator to be right in the middle for a “correct” exposure.
But what do you do if you point it at your subject and it’s not? Say it looks like this.
It’s giving you a lot of information. The indicator on the 1 tells you that you have “one stop” too much light. The 100 on the left is your shutter speed. The 1.4 is your aperture. The 100 on the right is your ISO. Your viewfinder, of course, may look just a bit different.
So how do you get rid of light?
You have three choices:
- Close your aperture one stop, reducing the light one stop.
- Speed your shutter speed one stop, reducing the light one stop. (The curtain opens faster, less light comes in! Thanks Vivre for finding my typo!)
- Decrease your ISO one stop, reducing the light one stop.
Three choices all to get you to a correct exposure. Well, kind of.
If you are pointing your camera at neutral gray, the indicator in the middle shows you a correct exposure.
If you are pointing your lens toward skin, then go to the plus side 2/3 stops. What the heck is that? And how do you remember? Think of it as two clicks from the middle or two of those little hash lines? How do you get there? Those same three choices I mentioned. Adjust your aperture, shutter speed, or ISO. Those three are always working together.
But what happens after you’ve adjusted your light meter to “the spot” you want it and it continues to bounce around? Once you’ve dialed it in you ignore your light meter until your subject or the light changes!
Give it a try and see what you find! For even more fun figuring out how all of your settings work together, try the SLR Camera Simulator. Or heck, just grab your camera and see what happens!
Now you know what Steph does! Have fun.
Now your creative photography begins.
P.S. It’s Steph here, I couldn’t resist popping in just to say that THIS amazing little trick Katrina shared today, is what FINALLY put me on manual mode, after 8 years!! I’ve been shooting in manual since Digiscrapapalooza… and that class I took with Katrina and it all started to make sense…and I cried. I had given up hope that I would ever move to manual mode. I’ve now shot over 1000 photos with the dial on the M for MANUAL! It still makes me a little giddy!
Share This Using…
Hi Katrina,
i don’t understand this one: ‘Slow your shutter speed one stop, reducing the light one stop’. I should think it’s the other way around? (But maybe it’s the foreign language that makes it difficult to me). Please tell me if i’m wrong – i want to understand!!!
I’ve loved playing that CameraSimulator: thanks for the link!!!
Ooh! Good catch. And yep, you are right. Sorry about that. I’ll fix it up to stop causing confusion.
Looks like you understand the exposure triangle!!
Thank you, Katrina!
And now, for the very FIRST time i played with the M and do understand the little line thingy
THANKS!!
Thanks for this post! I’m looking forward to getting home and experimenting over the weekend now! This sounds pretty simple and straight forward, so I might finally get my camera on Manual!
I know I am going to be playing around with this all weekend! Thank you, Katrina!
I’d bee struggling with manual mode for about a year and kept hearing about this mysterious internal light meter. Suddenly, about a month ago I noticed that line thingy. OMG!! What a world of difference. My photos are suddenly so much better!!!
Now if you can just tell us what the number is at the far right with the green circle by it……
Thanks for a great post!
So glad it is working for you!!
That number “13″ on the far right is the maximum burst number. It is a bit of an obscure number that I don’t reference often. It is going to change based on your settings (higher the ISO, the lower the fewer frames you can snap) and the speed of your card. While your camera is buffering the images the number changes to show you how many more it can save.
I so want to leave work right now to go home and grab my camera!! Thank you Katrina Kennedy for explaining something that has never connected w/ me before, after many books, the manual, etc. Your a godsend!
Kimberly! I’m so glad to help!
thank you so much! this is the plainest I’ve ever seen it described. Trying to figure out how to copy and paste this into a doc to SAVE!
Thanks for the comment about the skin! I have been working on taking pictures in manual mode, and I will try adjusting my exposure. Would it be the same for all skin colors?
Not quite since darker skin will reflect less light. You can also meter off of the palm of your hand to be really consistent. Just place it in the same light as your subject, meter, focus on your subject, ignore your light meter, and shoot!
Nice and simple. Thank you so much, I know that this will make so much sense for so many people trying out their DSLRs
I tried this as soon as I heard it on the DigiShow and it was a revelation! Still needing loads of practice and doing a fair amount of editing, but I have gone to M!