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Top Deck: Metering and Flashes

Lesson 9 from: Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark II Fast Start

John Greengo

Top Deck: Metering and Flashes

Lesson 9 from: Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark II Fast Start

John Greengo

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Lesson Info

9. Top Deck: Metering and Flashes

That same AF shortcut will also control metering with the front dial. Learn how metering modes can help get the best exposure. Then, learn how to pair the camera with a flash, from the included FL-LM3 to more powerful flashes, which are sold separately.

Lesson Info

Top Deck: Metering and Flashes

All right, next up, same button but the front dial controls our metering system. And so, we have a number of different metering systems. So, let's look a little bit more detail as to what's going on. The first and most basic of these metering systems is the Digital ESP. The Electro-Servo Pattern which is 324 segments, and is really good for mixed and general lighting situations. And anything where you're gonna have brights and shadows, it really kind of does this amazing job of analyzing all the areas, running it through an algorithm, and then coming up with a proper exposure for it. For those who like a traditional metering system, cameras back from the 70s and 80s used center weighted metering. And so, if you have a subject in the middle of the frame that fills up most of the frame, it's gonna do a nice even job on that. Some photographers like to have a very precise area so that they can meter the light in one particular area, and then it doesn't matter how bright or how dark the re...

st of the area is. And so, if you have a small subject that is of average brightness, the spot area would do a pretty good job. Now, the camera has a couple of other metering modes that are not common on other cameras. The first is a Spot Highlight mode. And so, it's a spot metering but it gives it about a two stop EV push. And so, it's great for putting on a subject that you know you want to be brighter than average, but you don't want that area to be blown out. And so, the Spot Shadow is exactly the opposite. It's an area you would put on an area that is notably dark, but that you don't want to be perfectly black. And so, it's gonna really depend on how you, your style of shooting as to what you would choose. For the most part, I use the Digital ESP meter about 100% of the time. I will do some tweaking manually or with the exposure compensation from there. But these are just different tools to accommodate different ways that different people work. All right, so we got a lot of controls with those two buttons. But if you want, we can have different controls with those two buttons. You can go in to the Button/Dial/Lever options for the function lever settings and switch settings, and you can go in and you can change what these control. And so, if you don't like these controlling the drive, HDR, focusing, and metering, well you can have them control Bracketing and Flash Exposure Compensation. If you find those more useful, you can do that in the Function Lever settings. Camera has a Hot Shoe. It's got a little cover on it, which isn't real important but it comes with a little Hot Shoe. And so, let's talk a little bit about the optional flashes from Olympus. It comes with the FL-LM3 which is a not very powerful flash. But if you just need a little kicker there, it'll do the job. It has a little bit of a tilt upwards. It's not powerful enough to work under most bounce situations, but you can use it if necessary or if it does work. They do have a number of larger flashes that are gonna sell for more money and are gonna have much, much more power. Most of these flashes are available for use with the wireless flash system that we'll talk a little bit about. These other ones will use external batteries. And as you can see, their guide number, their power rating is much, much higher. So, if you are gonna be shooting flash for multiple subjects very quickly or larger groups, or on a regular basis, I would probably look at the FL- which is their top of the line flash. They do make a couple of other smaller flashes which can be use wirelessly. And so, they do give you the wireless option of triggering an off camera flash cause you do need a flash on your camera to trigger all of the other ones. All right, next up we do have stereo microphones so that when you are recording you'll get stereo sound. It's not the greatest sound in the world but it does record that. And then there's a little UFO or Saturn symbol on the side, and that is the focal plane. Not really important to most photographers, but if you're into macro photography or cinematography where you need to measure the distance from where the sensor is to your subject, that is where the sensor is and how deep it is into the camera. Are there different versions of Lightroom that support or don't support what you showed earlier with the ... So, as I was warming up for today's class and trying it on My computer, it wasn't working because I was using Lightroom version 6. and you need to either 6.9 or 6.10, if I recall the numbers correctly. So, you do need kind of the current versions of Lightroom to work because this camera and that ORI file to my knowledge did not exist more than just a couple months ago. And so, all those old versions of Lightroom didn't know about this. And so, Adobe didn't know how to read those files but now they do. Cool. Well, actually let me clarify. Lightroom still does not know how to identify the ORI files, but they can identify the new files or F files from this camera. Okay. When would you wanna shoot ... Jerry asked, when would you wanna shoot in hi-res mode versus-- The hi-res mode might be good if you are trying to get, obviously, the largest resolution of a subject that's not moving. So, let's say your friend did a painting and they need a high resolution copy of this painting for archival reasons. You could set it up, the picture's not moving, or the sculpture or whatever artwork they did is not moving. You got your camera on a tripod. So, a situation like that. Architectural photography, it could work quite well for that. It's just not gonna work for handheld. It's not gonna work super well for landscape if there's a lot of things moving. Okay. If it's trees moving, that's really bad. If it's water moving, that's probably not so bad. Okay.

Class Materials

Bonus Materials with Purchase

Olympus EM1II Recommended Settings

Ratings and Reviews

a Creativelive Student
 

This is exactly what I was looking for - I really feel like I'm not able to control my camera, rather than the camera controlling me! :) I really learned a great deal - some of it was a great review, some of it was crucial information that will (hopefully) make me a better photographer. Thanks for a great class, John!!

Spyro Zarifopoulos
 

Great and very informative class.... John has done a fabulous job explaining all the simple and intricate details of the very sophisticated EM1 II. Thank you !!!

John Epperson
 

This is a great course on learning about the OM-D E-M1 Mark II. I have watched it many times to get to were I know it by memory the best I can. I like to go over it as much as possible because there is a lot to learn. I do wish that John would do an updated version since now it is up to Firmware 3.1. It is like a whole new camera with the new settings.

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