Metering Choices on Rebel Digital

[RajaBhat]

Hi, all,

www.robgalbraith.com has a review of the soon to be released Rebel Digital (the D300). (nice web site BTW)
He states that in P Av and Tv modes, you cannot use center weighted metering. You can switch temporarilly to partial (spot) metering. And in M mode, center weighted only; no evaluative. Maybe that is logical, I have to think about that one! (M mode is SO different in the Elan IIE that I have and the G3, E-TTL metering does not work in that mode on the G3 whereas in the Elan IIE M mode, you can choose your shutter and aperture, and the flash fills in just what you need. Nice. Bad thing in a studio, though, as the preflash makes studio lights fire prematurely.

That, and also the AF mode is set to AI Focus mode, which uses one shot, and switches to servo automatically if the subject moves. In the 10D apparently you can choose any one of the three modes; with the Digital Rebel you cannot. I have an Elan IIE, and usually leave the AF mode in AI Focus anyhow!!! In Portrait mode, the camera chooses one-shot, and in sports mode it chooses AI-Servo. You cannot change that.

Are these two problems going to be serious setbacks? I don't think so!! Canon's evaluative metering is SO good with backlighting problems that I doubt that I will miss center weighted. Indeed I have not used center weighted with my G3 so far.

Raja

[Guillermo Freige]

Raja:
I'm of the same opinion. After all, is a entry level DSLR, not even a "prosumer" one as the 10D. And, the AI focus mode isn't too bad to me. If you need to really lock focus, you can focus in AF and then switch to MF to keep focus in that point. And the evaluative by default and partial switch in AE lock is a good compromise, except you want to lock an evaluative metering! But is not too bad either.
One thing I will miss in the 300D (yes, I will buy one as soon as I can, except something very bad appears in the reviews) is the inhability to sync flash at second courtain. I prefer this setting because in long shutter pictures, it freezes movement at the end of the take and looks much more natural. Too bad it isn't possible with the 300D. The S50 has the ability, so probably i will continue to take this kind of pictures with it.

[RajaBhat]

Guillermo,
Sorry to hear that you cannot do 2nd curtain flash. BUT...I can't think of even one photo with any of my cameras that I needed 2nd curtain anyhow....what I *really* want is to be able to use the viewfinder like an SLR.
Raja

[Andy_T]

Hello Guillermo,

the 300D can't sync flash on the second curtain? That's not so good.

On my G2, I manually set the flash on my flash (Metz 40 MZII with Canon SCA 3000 adapter) to second curtain sync, as I didn't find it in any of the cameras menus.

Maybe that's possible with Canon flashes / the 300D as well?

Regards,
Andy