condensation difficulties.....

how do you deal with this building on the front element of the lens? I was by the ocean this a.m. and never shot that early in the a.m. before and had a hard time with it. The hood helps some, but air still gets there..

I did not get any keepers, will post my problem shots when I get back home, they are all in raw format, and do not have photoshop installed on this laptop, which is very old.

I had a hard time achieving sharp focus in little light, with a small aperture...I was of course, trying manual exposure.. I was using eval. metering, and a center point..........

I know without the shots giving me advice will be difficult, maybe I can download the free gimp for the laptop as a way to get the raws into jpgs...I will see what I can do about getting the shots up.....

UPDATE: ok figured out to upload photos even though I don't have the full photoshop on laptop. I did shoot the sun in thirds, this is just the first shot edited - was experimenting...

http://www.flickr.com …/26267127@N03/4​909940979/

If you were using manual exposure, your metering mode should not matter. To get your exposure right, set your camera to AV and half press your shutter. See what the meter says the proper shutter speed should be. Flip to manual, set up those settings you got from your AV metering and take the shot - adjust your shutter speed to make adjustments from there. Try to get one good exposure for the sky, and one for the ground to blend.

Remember to keep your camera on a tripod, ISO 100, and at least a 2 second timer on your shutter.

Do a google search for and download a hyperfocal distance chart for your camera. Bring a small light to your next shoot and dont bother looking through the view finder. Just set your focus on the distance window on your lens based on your camera settings.

It may be too late for this as your post is 6 days old, but I have had good success using a hair dryer to heat up the camera before taking it from an air-conditioned environment into a hot, humid one.

^put it in the trunk, when I wake up to shower and get ready early AM Ill go stick my camera bag in my trunk, put a blanket that i keep in there over it, and than head off. By the time I get to my destination ~40 minutes I can pull her out and fire away.