JPEG shooters- ALO or HTP?

Hey all, probably not the best place to ask because raw is the bomb, but here goes nothing.

I've been doing a lot of research trying to get the best out of my JPEG shots, for when on time constraints.

I have been shooting with HTP on in sunny conditions, +1/3ec with contrast set to -1 in my chosen picture style. For me at the moment, I'm not unhappy with this, works for me.

I had never really taken a second glance at Auto Lighting Optimiser, but figured it might be beneficial. Just wanted to get a feel on the general consensus of this feature.

Is it just what I'm looking for?
Is it to be avoided at all cost?
I see it disables the use of HTP, so which is the lesser of two evils here?

Hoping to learn something new here, so if those more wise than myself could shed some light on what's going on, that'd be greatly appreciated

Adam.

HTP attempts to fake more dynamic range by exposing the highlights low and then lift the shadows. Can be useful in bright light. The drawback is some more noise in the shadows, but they usually aren't the most important part of the image anyway.
ALO works in all lights. Attempts to create contrast where it's low and reduce it where it's very high. So somewhat a similar effect, but with a wider target.

So HTP is for bright light only. Like clear sunshine.
If you shoot RAW, you can apply ALO after the fact, using DPP in your computer. Thus that part is easy to figure out. Just shoot RAW, preferably "typical" images (if you have any), then test to see if and what degree of ALO makes the images look better to you. Then use that for jpegs.

Neither of them increase the dynamic range of the sensor. HTP favors the top (brighter) portion of the histogram. ALO favors the bottom (darker) portion of the histogram. Both mess with your exposure. I tried both when I moved to Canon digital about 7 years ago. I found both of them useless, because the messed with my chosen exposure. I currently use a 6D and 70D, and still find both (ALO & HTP) of them a hindrance.

If you want to emphasize the brighter, end use some +EC, and darken the shadows/blacks. If you want to emphasize the darker end, use some -EC, and lighten the highlights/whites. I get more predictable results by NOT using ALO/HTP.

apersson850 wrote in post #17956763
HTP attempts to fake more dynamic range by exposing the highlights low and then lift the shadows. Can be useful in bright light. The drawback is some more noise in the shadows, but they usually aren't the most important part of the image anyway.

Yep, I'm really not too concerned with a little bit of noise in the shaddows. With karting shots, there aren't many important areas full of detail in the shaddows anyway.

apersson850 wrote in post #17956763
If you shoot RAW, you can apply ALO after the fact, using DPP in your computer. Thus that part is easy to figure out. Just shoot RAW, preferably "typical" images (if you have any), then test to see if and what degree of ALO makes the images look better to you. Then use that for jpegs.

With most of my shots already taken with HTP I cannot apply ALO in DPP. In the ones that I do have in RAW that I can use, they're not exactly specific to what I want so I'll have to go out and get more shots to try it out. Thanks for your input!

Bassat wrote in post #17956833
If you want to emphasize the brighter, end use some +EC, and darken the shadows/blacks. If you want to emphasize the darker end, use some -EC, and lighten the highlights/whites. I get more predictable results by NOT using ALO/HTP.

But the goal here for me is to get the best OOC JPEG shots with no/minimal processing, so I'm trying to utilize the options that Canon have given us to make nice pictures

For me, protecting from big blown highlights while still having a reasonably well exposed picture is whats important, and that's how I ended up with -1 contrast, +1/3ec with HTP on. It's not perfect, but not bad, so I'll experiment with ALO when I can and see what comes from it.