7D overexposing inside and out

I've used a 7D to shoot collegiate sports action for three school years (and just starting the fourth school year). So this year I'm suddenly having problems with overexposure. In the past I have never had to reduce the brightness in DPP. But it has been necessary several times in the last two weeks (for soccer and volleyball).

When it happened, my camera was set in Aperture Priority mode. Soccer aperture setting was 9. Volleyball was 2.5. My ISO was 400 for soccer and 3200 for volleyball. The shutter speeds the camera chose seemed correct, but maybe the camera is guessing low now?

Is this a side effect of the most recent firmware update (which I installed)?

Any ideas how I can fix it? (Other than going to straight manual mode.)

So far the only problem with the new 7D firmware that I have heard of is some freezing up issues for some people.

You don't accidentally have exposure compensation set do you?

How bout posting some sample images with the EXIF data intact.

Exposure compensation set inadvertently, or changed metering mode without realizing is probably the two most common reasons for such a problem.

Have youtried shooting some test shots in manual or shutter priority? Best of luck!

I would suggest the following;
1. Go out under certain conditions and attempt to meter it again- 3200 may be a bit high for outdoors during the day.. just sayin.
2. Check which metering mode you were using... Happens sometimes when we change to a metering mode like SPOT and forgot that we did.
3. try resetting the camera back to defaults- in case you have an errant setting somewhere in the camera's memory...

4. You might want to try Auto-ISO if in TV or AV.

I would look at the metering mode, if you were accidentally spot metering a very dark part of the scene, you could blow out the rest of the photo. If things looked fine when you chimped and the photos still came out overexposed, I agree with Wayne, pull both batteries and let the camera do a full reset.

apersson850 wrote in post #14998083
Exposure compensation set inadvertently, or changed metering mode without realizing is probably the two most common reasons for such a problem.

+1^

I have been noticed the same thing with mine after upgrading the firmware, twice. I am overexposing some also and my colors seem to be way oversaturated. Mainy the reds and yellows but have noticed some in the purple range as well. I have switched modes and checked the fore mentioned as well. I even tried it out in full auto.

To answer all your questions, I checked exposure compensation and it has not been inadvertently reset. Neither has metering mode. I keep it on evaluative all the time. As for ISO I used 3200 inside and 400 outside.

I shot another soccer game today and had better results than I did with the aforementioned games. Maybe because the sunlight was attenuated by high clouds. Here's a sample to show you what I mean.

I basically never shoot Av and evaluative, but I just tried some shots with my 7D using those and the camera seemed to expose fine (I updated to the 2.0.3 firmware the day it came out). Your sample does look a little over-exposed. I wouldn't expect evaluative to push the exposure a lot just because of the one player in a dark uniform, since there's plenty of white and close to neutral tones in the overall scene. This is a strange issue for sure.

You're in Auto on the sample, and sub 1/200th of a sec shutter at f/10 ISO 400; I'd be in Av, wide open (4.5 on this lens) at ISO 100, cut the noise as much as possible and would be expecting to see shutter speeds upward of 1/800 in similar outdoor mixed cloud lighting, which should be sufficient to freeze those cleats. Not sure what you've got going for metering mode, but that sample looks like it may very well have spot metered the blue jersey.

Barring it being a setting issue, try pressing the DOF preview button and seeing if the viewfinder gets darker, I wonder if the camera is calculating for the blades to close down but they may be mechanically stuck or have a dirty contact. And if that's the case shooting wide open will have things metering properly until the lens is fixed/replaced.

Also I'd be curious how many exposures on your shutter and if the shutter speed is changing between exposures, along the same lines of thinking.

Trique Daddi wrote in post #14998093
Have youtried shooting some test shots in manual or shutter priority? Best of luck!

Manual is always best, especially if the lighting in consistant.

Ralpho,, try this. With camera in manual, set the ISO to suit the lighting. With pitch sports, 400 ISO is plenty for a sunny day. Now, take a meter reading off something neutral in tonality (grass is good). Even the back of your hand will do. Ensure your shutterspped is sufficient to freeze any movement. Use this setting, chimp and adjust as necessary.

The problem with sports, players wear different toned clothing. If for example a player is wearing black and you are in an auto mode, there is every chance your shot will be overexposed, the opposite for a white strip.

Ralpho wrote in post #15000234
To answer all your questions, I checked exposure compensation and it has not been inadvertently reset. Neither has metering mode. I keep it on evaluative all the time. As for ISO I used 3200 inside and 400 outside.

I shot another soccer game today and had better results than I did with the aforementioned games. Maybe because the sunlight was attenuated by high clouds. Here's a sample to show you what I mean.

I have a sneaking suspicion your camera metered for the dark shirts and dark background.

Motor On wrote in post #15000471
You're in Auto on the sample, and sub 1/200th of a sec shutter at f/10 ISO 400; I'd be in Av, wide open (4.5 on this lens) at ISO 100, cut the noise as much as possible and would be expecting to see shutter speeds upward of 1/800 in similar outdoor mixed cloud lighting, which should be sufficient to freeze those cleats. Not sure what you've got going for metering mode, but that sample looks like it may very well have spot metered the blue jersey.

Barring it being a setting issue, try pressing the DOF preview button and seeing if the viewfinder gets darker, I wonder if the camera is calculating for the blades to close down but they may be mechanically stuck or have a dirty contact. And if that's the case shooting wide open will have things metering properly until the lens is fixed/replaced.

Also I'd be curious how many exposures on your shutter and if the shutter speed is changing between exposures, along the same lines of thinking.

Interesting suggestion. Shooting wide open outside. I thought the idea was to stop down as much as possible without slowing the shutter speed too much so as to have greater depth of field. (At least that's what I like to go for.) You're saying forget about depth of field and concentrate on getting a high shutter speed and low noise. Right?

I'll give that a try at my next game. But how I have the same overexposure problem inside with an aperture of 2.5. How does that fit your theory?

I don't know how many actuations are on my shutter. But I have used the camera to shoot upwards of 80 games per school year for three years. If I averaged 250 actuations per game I'm probably upwards of 60,000 now. How many actuations is the 7D supposed to be good for?