Camera Labs

. I dont know why but most of the above posters seem to assume it was a bright day in spite of me exactly saying it was a gloomy, dim and cloudy day with no sharp sun of any sort. It was almost going to rain. So im talking light thats equal to complete sunset with no light rays. Just dim dull skyllight.

Razvan > Assuming i was blaming the camera is silly. In fact i blamed myself clearly to start with by saying i must've messed something up in the custom functions. All im trying to say is. Im not a complete newbie to the manual mode. Ive been shooting only in manual since i got my 500d. And since then ive never had a single blown out pic. A tad bit over exposed maybe but not to this extent. And ive shot mostly on bright days. Dont you think for someone whos been shooting for months only on manual, to suddenly find a drastic change wont be something to do with the exposure traingle. After months of doing this i suddenly forgot what to do with the manual mode is it ?

Also maybe stopping down to F16 might help. But wont i lose my shallow depth of field ? I wanted some shallow DOF for that shot. Stoping down to F16 will make everything sharp wont it.

The fact is that only you know precisely what was in your frame, people here make suggestions for you to solve the problem. Some may be way off, and some might actually help.
Another thing to consider is the metering mode used.
If it's set to meter the small portion of your frame and your subject is dim compared to the surroundings, in exteme cases, the surrundings may be greatly over exposed. But if all the frame is over exposed this may not be the case.
Sometimes the light, as we percieve it, may be missleading.
The meter on your camera is more objective. The question is what did it show when you took that shot. Did it show over exposure or not ?
If it didn't, maybe you have used exposure lock and reframed the picture.
That could give you that effect.
Bu if the over exposure is consistent in many frames, that couldn't be the case either.
Mabe you haven't payed attention to the exposure meter and used a shutter speed / aperture pair from another situation. I'm sure you know that those won't change when you half press the shutter button in manual mode. You use the ones you have set previously, those could be from a week ago. The first day I used the 50D I forgot that the camera is set on manual and took a few shots as if it was in program mode (using aperture and shutter speed that had no relation to the actual shot), The pics came out beautifully white

At the moment I can't think of anything else.
But this doesn't mean that this is all.
If you want a shallow DOF you can(almost) always open the aperture and use the shutter speed that gives you the correct exposure.
Hope that helps

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Radu
Canon PowerShot S100
Canon 50D , SIGMA 10-20 f3.5 ,Canon EF 24-105 L IS USM, Canon EF 100/2.8 macro Canon EF 50/1.4 ,Canon EF 85 f1.8,Canon EF-S17-85 4-5.6 Old Tamron 28-300 inherited from my Canon Rebel G film camera
Canon580EXII
http://www.errre.net

Yeah, no pics = fail.

Are you sure you didn't mess with the picture styles or something?


The only explanation I have for it is that you had sunglasses on.

Or maybe your lens reads aperture 8 as 5.6.

who knows...

If you get a chance, read my post...I didn't presume any lighting conditions, nor did I assume your knowledge of manual control to be lacking...so it might be helpful. If you can post one of your bad pictures, it would really help us get a feel for the problem - whether it's some kind of sensor failure, camera mode problem, lens issue (such as a stuck aperture blade), or possibly a setting which you thought was manually set, but had accidentally been bumped or adjusted (like ISO somehow being accidentally on 12,800 or something). Without any photos demonstrating the problem, it's awfully hard for everyone here to figure out what the problem might be, and hard also to presume what level of knowledge and skill you have...but obviously many folks are willing to try to help.

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Justin Miller
Sony DSLR-A580 / Sony 18-250mm / Minolta 50mm F1.7 / Sigma 30mm F1.4 / Tamron 10-24mm / Tamron 200-500mm / Tamron 90mm F2.8 macro / Minolta 300mm F4 APO
Sony NEX5N / 18-55mm F3.5-5.6 / 55-210mm F4-6.3 / Pentax K adapter / Konica K/AR adapter / bunches o' Konica & Pentax lenses!

Galleries:
http://www.pbase.com/zackiedawg

Zackie > Thats the main mistake i made. If you read in my first or second post itself i mentioned that i made the mistake of deleting each blown out pic right after each respective shot. I needed space on my 16gb card as i had to shoot some video too. I definitely understand everyone is trying to help. Thanks for that. At least i can vent my frustration here . I think i might have meddled with some functions. Part of my learning process. Im not extremely skilled in photography. Thats for others to say. I hope to be good one day.

The only thing im trying to say is that ive been using M mode for quite sometime to make a basic mistake on the external settings. Which is why i suspect having messed up some custom function. See this link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxmUckHwgpU of the pics iv shot, all in manual mode. Quite simple pics but the point is all are taken in manual over several situations but ive never had blownout pure white screens.

But when i use any of the basic modes the problem never occured. That rules out a stuck aperture blade right ?

Is your camera set to 'matrix' metering? (or whatever your brand of camera calls it)

When I shoot a large landscape and I have it set to spot metering on a dark pine tree, the rest of the photo is overexposed.

When shooting set your camera to matrix metering, make sure you have the light meter set to 0 when you set your aperture and shutter.


Good Luck

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"If I want a 'snapshot'... i will use my phone.."

My Photos:
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The metering mode shouldn't matter in his case, as he's setting shutter and aperture manually. The metering isn't choosing the settings.

As for stuck aperture blade...I wouldn't rule it out completely. There could be strange situations where it might occur in one mode and not another. For example, if it's just a bit 'sticky', possibly in the P or S mode the camera is cycling it while setting up the shot, or because it is adjusting quickly vie the motor in the lens or camera body, it pushes past the stick point - but in manual where you are setting it, the motor isn't having to cycle it as far and it can get hung up. Also, sometimes the lens/body connection can be interfered with and cause weird glitches - clean off the sensors on the lens and camera body where the electronics interface...it can't hurt.

Sensor failures result often in white out situations...but those wouldn't seem likely to occur only in M mode.

Auto ISO could potentially be an issue, but you'd need to check the EXIF on a bad shot to see if the ISO was in auto mode...many cameras don't maintain the same ISO setting between different modes, so if you set to ISO200 in 'P' mode, then switch to 'M' mode, the camera might go to Auto ISO, or might remember the last setting in 'M' mode which could be different than 'P' mode. So it's possible you were manually set to ISO100 or 200 in a different mode, but manual mode somehow was in Auto.

Also, when you shoot in manual, are you choosing aperture and shutter settings based on what you feel you need or want, or are you using the camera's light meter to guide you to the right settings? That's the only other thing I can think of that could cause blown out shots - if the camera meter gave you a false reading and you set the manual settings based on the meter. In that case, a spot meter reading on a shadow area in a shot would give you bad overexposure metering advice.

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Justin Miller
Sony DSLR-A580 / Sony 18-250mm / Minolta 50mm F1.7 / Sigma 30mm F1.4 / Tamron 10-24mm / Tamron 200-500mm / Tamron 90mm F2.8 macro / Minolta 300mm F4 APO
Sony NEX5N / 18-55mm F3.5-5.6 / 55-210mm F4-6.3 / Pentax K adapter / Konica K/AR adapter / bunches o' Konica & Pentax lenses!

Galleries:
http://www.pbase.com/zackiedawg

The meteringmode does impact your metering!
Check it out, set your camera to M and use spot.
Change the exposure (to 0EV) and take a picture.
Then, set it to matrix and set it again to 0EV.
The photo will be else.

But, plainman, have you read my post? Have you checked your ISO?
If you want a small DoF set the shutter higher, 1/4000 with f/3,5 could work at a cloudy day.

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Ruben

Panasonic DMC-FZ18, Panasonic DMC-FZ28, Canon G5, Canon 350D, Canon 50D + BG-E2N
Tamron 17-50 2.8, Canon EF 70-200mm f/4L USM,
Canon 18-55 II plus lots of Minolta MD/M42 lenses and bodies

Lost in translation! We're saying the same essential thing - I agree that if attempting to follow the light meter's readings and achieve a '0' in manual mode on the meter, then yes, the camera metering mode is impacting the result. However, when I use Manual mode, I essentially ignore the camera's meter because I pretty much know what shutter and aperture combination I want to use just from having shot manually long enough...though the light meter may fluctuate and show you 0, underexposure, or overexposure, the camera will always take the photo at the settings you chose - so if you set the camera to F8 and 1/100, that's what the camera is going to do, even if the meter is indicating a 3-stop underexposure. It sounded to me like the OP had manually set his aperture and shutter to settings that at ISO100 or 200 would have been find for the conditions he was mentioning, yet the result was horribly blown out. I'd think if he had tried to get the meter reading to '0' on a spot-meter reading in a shadow area, certainly that could have happened. But ISO could also be at fault if it was too high.

Anyway, we agree that the meter works in taking a light reading even in manual mode, and that spot vs centerweight vs matrix can affect the reading...but ideally for me the purpose of Manual mode is to judge and set for yourself, not using the camera's meter. If I wanted to use the camera's meter reading, what's really the point of going to Manual? I could just use P or Auto and get the same thing! When I go to manual, I'm attempting to substitute the camera's brain with my own intelligence and experience, successfully or not.

_________________
Justin Miller
Sony DSLR-A580 / Sony 18-250mm / Minolta 50mm F1.7 / Sigma 30mm F1.4 / Tamron 10-24mm / Tamron 200-500mm / Tamron 90mm F2.8 macro / Minolta 300mm F4 APO
Sony NEX5N / 18-55mm F3.5-5.6 / 55-210mm F4-6.3 / Pentax K adapter / Konica K/AR adapter / bunches o' Konica & Pentax lenses!

Galleries:
http://www.pbase.com/zackiedawg