which ASA?

[Arild]

Need some basic understanding to cope with the rising sun into full springtime, eventually Summer

During the winter, my D750 has been on 400. all the time.

What would you recomend now a days, say with a Nikkor 24 - 120 and/or 18-35 Nikkor??

This photo, is just outside my house. Today, April 12th 2018.

[rosko]

Well, if you a tripod, you don't need to bother : display the nominal speed (according to the body you use. (100 isos with my Df).

Really, I woudn't use some thing faster with snow and sun !

The picture you show is good, I reckon : the shade on the snow renders well, the colour dynamics are fine. So you didn't need 640 isos for this pic. Why would you take the risk to get grain ?

Thanks for sharing,

Francis.

[Peter Forsell]

Need some basic understanding to cope with the rising sun into full springtime, eventually Summer

During the winter, my D750 has been on 400. all the time.

I think it is best not to limit one's shooting habits or shooting situations based on the time of the year. Rather than calendar, use your camera's exposure meter to determine which settings (including ISO) are most beneficial to the image you want to capture.

A very simplistic approach to exposure:


CASE A: not very fast moving subjects

1. Begin: set the ISO setting to the base ISO of your camera (ISO 100)
2. set your camera to A mode (aperture priority)
3. determine the depth of field your image requires and set the aperture accordingly
4. check the shutter speed your camera chooses, if it is too low (camera shake) use tripod, use VR and/or raise ISO until shutter speed is "safe"
5. shoot the picture

See pages 91-92 and 134-142 in the english user manual.


CASE B: fast moving subjects

1. Begin: set the ISO setting to the base ISO of your camera (ISO 100)
2. set your camera to S mode (shutter priority)
3. determine the shutter speed your subjects require (action stopping-> high SS, panning and/or motion blur -> lower SS). Set the shutter speed accordingly.
4. check the aperture value your camera chooses, if it already maxed out (camera displays "Lo"), raise ISO until an actual F-number is displayed; or lower shutter speed if possible.
5. shoot the picture

See pages 90 and 134-142 in the english user manual.

ISO 100 in the midnight in the winter (I'm in Finland) is perfectly usable. ISO 12800 in daylight in summer is perfectly usable. You decide what you want.

After you master the cases A and B above, you can use exposure compensation (manual pp. 143-144) when required and of course you can use deliberate underexposure and overexposure at will when your pictorial needs so dictate. And remember to have fun!


  Too long, didn't read version: 
Use the ISO setting last, after everything else. This approach usually minimizes digital noise. Start from the lowest and raise only when necessary.

Link to download the english manual: http://download.nikonimglib.com/archive3/nbv9u00rNwcC03nAlhH22OsaSF95/D750FM_DL(En)03.pdf

[Arild]

Case a is my scenario.

When I got my Nikon D750K back in autumn 2016, I set it at A. And have really not being using any others, maybe a few times S, never evar P

What i never gets the grips of is the metering button (inside of shutter button). Tried to understand the manual. Gave up, So I have been at Matrix for the last year.
Spot has never worked for my photos. I tried that Center Weighed thought it would give me a Nikon F3 HP metering, but no sucess. So Matrix is my mode ;-)

As a botanist, the fastest I encounter might be a daffodil waving at me :-)

As of the last three months I have been using that Meike batt grip, which helps me greatly esp in holding the camera
I "never" use tripod -- I simply have no room to get any tripod with me - tripod would be used at home.

[Matthew Currie]

With regard to metering:  the F3, as I recall, had a somewhat higher center spot weighting than others. Although the 12 mm. center circle is the same size as the default in a D750, I think the F3 gave it more weight. 

On the other question, I would follow scenario "A" above as well, but one possibility might also be to switch to Auto ISO, and, in the menu, set your auto ISO maximum to a low number, perhaps 400 if you're happy with 400.  If you then start at 100, the ISO will float up to your maximum as needed, when the shutter speed goes below 1/30 (or whatever other value you set), without intervention.  I don't see any advantage to choosing an ISO higher than the minimum if you don't have to.

[OCD]

I also have a Nikon D750.  I use Aperture Priority Mode.  But I turn on Auto ISO.  And then in the Auto ISO settings, I choose the minimum shutter speed that is acceptable to me and let the camera choose the ISO.  I also have Easy Exposure Compensation turned on.  I don't use tripods, so it's a nice set up for how I like to shoot.  The ability to set minimum shutter speed in Auto ISO is a game-changer for me, and I have the top item of my menu set to Auto ISO and the Fn button for easy access.  I mostly use primes, but when I am using a zoom with VR, I just set the shutter speed in Auto ISO to Auto.  This is mostly for still subjects.  With moving subjects, I'll increase the shutter speed. 

[Arild]

Auto ISO

Why the heck didnt I think of that ?

Still living in the good old days at the University - with my F3

I might perhapse turn the head realize things are at least 25 yearrs more advanced, at least tech stuff....

This photo is what I did for living and still is most important to reeally master completely:
Taken yesterday, d750 with 60 af-s g macro lens

[OCD]

Oh sigh, that is a beautiful photo...just what I need is some GAS for a 60mm f/2.8 G.   (And I like that focal length, my favorite lens is the 58mm f/1.4 G).

And yeah, the Auto ISO on the D750 is pretty nice because of the ability to also select the minimum shutter speed.  The Auto selection for minimum shutter speed will do the reciprocal of focal length.  For instance, the 60mm lens would have a 1/60 shutter speed.  As you select the "faster" setting it would go to 1/125 and then 1/250.  Or you can simply select the shutter speed you prefer.  Where I think the Auto is most helpful is with zooms.  Auto ISO will increase the shutter speed automatically as you change focal lengths on the zoom, a real nice feature in my book.  Once you hit the maximum ISO that you have selected, then the camera will lower the shutter speed below your minimum level, but I usually have the max at 12800 or 6400 so that rarely comes into play.

[Arild]

Sorry to say auto iso didnt work for me - at least today. My d750 did things I didnt feel comfy with.

This photo is today, at 1400 hours, at 250 iso. Maybe not such a piece of art, my dog would not turn its eyes to me,
but this will do as a memory of the day finally its springtime!

ISO 259 worked grreat today.

[Matthew Currie]

Different strokes...

I usually set the aperture in A mode, and, with "easy ISO" set, manually choose the ISO until the shutter speed is what I want.  Having previously used a D3200, whose Auto ISO is an undocumented mess, this works all right.  But one option here, if you want to speed things up, might be to switch to manual mode and put Auto ISO on.  Some nature photographers like this.   This will allow you to set both shutter and aperture just as you like, and the camera's meter will adjust ISO.  It's really the same thing as manually adjusting the ISO to produce a desired shutter speed, just letting the camera's meter do it.

edt to add:  of course an alternative might be not to change what you're doing, since the exposures you're getting look fine.

[Jack Dahlgren]

The great thing about digital cameras are that you have control over all three variables, aperture, shutter speed and media ISO.

When I used to shoot with film I’d use aperture priority which means the shutter speed will fall wherever it needs to make a proper exposure, compromising on aperture when necessary to keep reasonable shutter speed.

With Auto ISO it gets even better as I can have camer set to manual and set aperture and shutter where I like and let ISO take up the slack. When ISO gets too far out of range I can decide to compromise on either aperture or shutter speed. This approach is easy, predictable and gives you a high level of cont over what the camera does.

If I were a tripod shooter, I’d modify this a bit and fix the ISO and allow shutter speed to vary.

Note, all of this is made possible by having a camera with good high ISO performance. It works much better on my Df than it would on a D200.

[OCD]

Jack:  How do you do exposure compensation in M mode with Auto ISO turned on?  One of the reasons I like using Auto ISO in A mode is that exposure compensation is easy.  The one thing is having to go into the Auto ISO settings for minimum shutter speed, so I can see why M mode and Auto ISO has appeal - much easier to control both aperture and shutter speed, but the camera will adjust ISO to the meter....so wondering how exposure compensation works in that circumstance.  Thanks!

[Ann]

My usual practice is to work in Manual Mode so that i can choose both my aperture and my shutter speed and then use Auto ISO.
I use the ± Exposure button to modify exposure on the fly with that combination.

Often, I will note the value of ISO and may then set ISO back to Manual ISO at that value so that ISO won't shift when shooting a burst or a Pano.

Also, I find that the traditional rule of "shutter-speed should equal reciprocal of focal length" to be outdated with digital cameras: I prefer to double the shutter-speed and raise ISO to give me my required S/S.

[MILLIREHM]

I second Ann when it comes to shutter speeds in connection with modern highres Cameras - the old rule is no mor valid
for setting ISO values I try to avoid noise, which meanst the first approach starting with ISO 800 for FX and 400 for DX. Mostly use A with +/-exposure compensation

Dont confuse yourself with metering modes when trying to master the camera, in these days you can set it to Matrix and check the results with the histogram. In film days i did not use Matrix metering because I did not know what it was doing but centerweighted mode instead, now that I can control it is vice versa, mostly just using matrix-metering. (or spotmetering - which is coupled with the af-field  for birds in flight / esp. against the sky).

BTW: the classical NIkon centerweighted mode was 60/40% weight on the 12 mm circle, the F3 was the more selective exception with its 80/20 ratio. Later Nikon invented the 75/25 formula (F801/s and F4). Nikon allows us to tune the diameter of the central circle but not the ratio (requiring a CPU-lens). Never played with that feature, nor calculated what would be the best to equal the old standards.

[OCD]

My usual practice is to work in Manual Mode so that i can choose both my aperture and my shutter speed and then use Auto ISO.
I use the ± Exposure button to modify exposure on the fly with that combination.

Often, I will note the value of ISO and may then set ISO back to Manual ISO at that value so that ISO won't shift when shooting a burst or a Pano.

Also, I find that the traditional rule of "shutter-speed should equal reciprocal of focal length" to be outdated with digital cameras: I prefer to double the shutter-speed and raise ISO to give me my required S/S.

Thank you Ann.  My experience in M mode has been with Auto ISO off, so exposure compensation doesn't do anything but move the center point in the grid in the viewfinder.  With Auto ISO turned on then...when you use exposure compensation then the ISO will change, that's pretty cool.  I agree on shutter speed, I also double shutter speed when using primes (and no VR).  The "Auto" mode for minimum shutter speed in Auto ISO has a couple "faster" settings, the first one doubles, and the second one doubles again (i.e. 1/60 to 1/125 to 1/250).