eye-AF and metering mode question

Sakisf · Nov 21, 2018

Maybe it's done on purpose. Spot metering (1%) on an eye with small iris will lead to underexposure and on one with big iris to overexposure (unless iris colour is very light). Same with spot metering on face (I think Sony does 10 or 15%) it will make a rather dull face putting it at 18% and you will need to dial EV compensation.

btw from Sony manual: When [Spot] is selected and [Focus Area] is set to either [Flexible Spot] or [Expand Flexible Spot] while [Spot Metering Point] is set to [Focus Point Link], the spot metering point can be coordinated with the focus area.

When [Multi] is selected and [Face Prty in Mlti Mtr] is set to [On], the camera measures brightness based on detected faces.

So spot cannot be connected on face but probably multi exposes better with face detect as it avoids making the face gray.

robert614 · Nov 21, 2018

Sakisf said:
Maybe it's done on purpose. Spot metering (1%) on an eye with small iris will lead to underexposure and on one with big iris to overexposure (unless iris colour is very light). Same with spot metering on face (I think Sony does 10 or 15%) it will make a rather dull face putting it at 18% and you will need to dial EV compensation.

btw from Sony manual: When [Spot] is selected and [Focus Area] is set to either [Flexible Spot] or [Expand Flexible Spot] while [Spot Metering Point] is set to [Focus Point Link], the spot metering point can be coordinated with the focus area.

When [Multi] is selected and [Face Prty in Mlti Mtr] is set to [On], the camera measures brightness based on detected faces.

Thanks for the confirmation about the Multi metering and faces. I thought that was the case, but wasn’t sure.

I find the multi metering on my A9 to be pretty reliable. So much so, I rarely switch to anything else.

The only time I’ve used spot is when I was photographing a room and I metered for the sky outside through a window.

Sakisf said:
So spot cannot be connected on face but probably multi exposes better with face detect as it avoids making the face gray.

Carerra · Nov 21, 2018

robert614 said:
aarif said:

robert614 said:

I just tried spot metering with the “Spot Metering Point” set to Focus Point Link to see if the camera would meter off the Eye AF focus point. No dice.

The camera meters off the Center Spot Focus Point. Exposure changes if I hover over dark or light colors with the spot metering circle. Even though I have the Green Eye-AF box continuously on the eye.

However. I believe when in multi metering mode, if the camera detects a face, the camera will meter off the face. I could be wrong about that though.

What metering mode do you typically use?

Click to expand...

typically I use spot metering set to focus point link. in some cases I shoot Manual Mode just to avoid this issue but even in M mode I can't use Auto-ISO for the same reason. entire screen works best but it's not perfect. to move the AF point to where the eye is slows you down. I really think Sony should link eye-AF with metering by firmware update.

But i'm not sure if they're aware of this issue and I haven't seen anyone talking about it.

thanks for your reply

Click to expand...

I’ve been thinking about this. If Sony did incorporate spot metering off the Eye-AF, would it meter differently for people with different colored eyes?

Would someone with dark eyes cause it to overexposed? Conversely, would someone with light blue eyes cause under exposure?

I’m thinking if the camera is smart enough to find eyes. Then it knows those eyes belong to a face. So the camera would ideally meter off the face.

You could still call it Eye-AF metering. But technically, the camera would meter off the face.

It would be a huge problem for eye af to be connected to metering, there is no reason at all to need this feature

sjazz · Nov 21, 2018

Cameras measure reflected light, so when the scene has a lot of different surfaces illuminated in a different way, the camera evaluates and gives an average.

You can use metering priority to the face, it helps as the camera find the face and then the eye. Metering the eye is not a good idea because if the subject has very dark eyes, everything will be overexposed.

But if you want the challenge of dropping the Auto features, you can still go old fashion and set a grey card in front of your subject face, measure with the camera and keep that exposure in M mode until the light changes. Another way is measure incident light over the face with an external light meter as the Sekonics used in studio or that fancy meter that plugs to the iPhone. That reading works well until the light changes due to a cloud, etc.

Live view on the EVF helps with zebras (100%) activated, Adjust exposure until there are no zebras on the skin.

texdpl · Nov 21, 2018

If someone has a glass eye and takes the eye out and lays it on the table beside them, will the Sony focus on the eye?

Pixel Pooper · Nov 21, 2018

aarif said:
typically I use spot metering set to focus point link.

This is your problem. Spot metering is best used in combination with AEL for metering off a grey card, or a scene element that corresponds to a mid tone. Linking spot metering to focus point is basically asking for inconsistent results unless you only focus on mid tone subjects. Linking it to Eye-AF would be even more inconsistent.

aarif said:
in some cases I shoot Manual Mode just to avoid this issue but even in M mode I can't use Auto-ISO for the same reason. entire screen works best but it's not perfect. to move the AF point to where the eye is slows you down. I really think Sony should link eye-AF with metering by firmware update.

That would be a bad idea. You need to use the appropriate metering mode for the scene, regardless of focus point. In most cases that will be Multi mode and you may need exposure compensation for challenging scenes.

aarif said:
But i'm not sure if they're aware of this issue and I haven't seen anyone talking about it.

They are not aware of the issue because it isn't an issue.

aarif · Nov 21, 2018

Carerra said:
It would be a huge problem for eye af to be connected to metering, there is no reason at all to need this feature

no I disagree. it will work same as spot metering exactly like you move the AF spot to the eye when shooting portaits

aarif · Nov 21, 2018

sjazz said:
You can use metering priority to the face, it helps as the camera find the face and then the eye. Metering the eye is not a good idea because if the subject has very dark eyes, everything will be overexposed.

see before eye-AF we used to move the Af-point to the eye for best focus specially shooting wide-open. so if you have an option of linking spot metering to eye-AF it will work exactly in the same way.

I don't see a problem with that plus it will be an option that you can choose

techjedi · Nov 21, 2018

aarif said:
I don't think there is a way to link the eye-AF with the metering mode. which causing the image to over or under expose if the AF point is some where else. like the background which is much brighter for example. wish that Sony could come up with a firmware to link them together when using the eye-AF.

or am I missing something

There is an option on the newer models (A9, A7rIII, A7III).

There is a menu option "Face Prty in Mlti Mtr". When set to "On" this lets the metering system use the detected face for metering when the metering mode is "Multi"

When an eye is detected with EyeAF, it first detected a face and that face is used for metering when the above setting is On. It wouldn't make sense to meter only the eye specifically since dark eye makeup wouldn't really be useful, nor would the whites of the sclera, etc.

aarif · Nov 21, 2018

thank you

aarif · Nov 21, 2018

techjedi said:
There is an option on the newer models (A9, A7rIII, A7III).

There is a menu option "Face Prty in Mlti Mtr". When set to "On" this lets the metering system use the detected face for metering when the metering mode is "Multi"

Can see it in the A7iii but not in the A9

Carerra · Nov 21, 2018

aarif said:
aarif said:

It would be a huge problem for eye af to be connected to metering, there is no reason at all to need this feature

Click to expand...

no I disagree. it will work same as spot metering exactly like you move the AF spot to the eye when shooting portaits

Terrible idea

aarif · Nov 21, 2018

that's you own opinion and if it's an option don't use it

techjedi · Nov 22, 2018

aarif said:
aarif said:

There is an option on the newer models (A9, A7rIII, A7III).

There is a menu option "Face Prty in Mlti Mtr". When set to "On" this lets the metering system use the detected face for metering when the metering mode is "Multi"

Click to expand...

Can see it in the A7iii but not in the A9

You are right. I don't have an A9, but I thought it had this feature. I just searched the manual and I guess it was added with the A7RIII and then A7III.

aarif · Nov 22, 2018

techjedi said:
techjedi said:

Can see it in the A7iii but not in the A9

Click to expand...

You are right. I don't have an A9, but I thought it had this feature. I just searched the manual and I guess it was added with the A7RIII and then A7III.

So what do you think about the eye-AF working as spot metering when activated.

JerseySailor · Nov 22, 2018

aarif said:
I guess you have no idea what I'm talking about or is it the beer talking

aarif,

Please be nice when responding to another member - or consider holding off responding at all.

Kevin

techjedi · Nov 23, 2018

aarif said:
aarif said:

aarif said:

Can see it in the A7iii but not in the A9

Click to expand...

You are right. I don't have an A9, but I thought it had this feature. I just searched the manual and I guess it was added with the A7RIII and then A7III.

Click to expand...

So what do you think about the eye-AF working as spot metering when activated.

I am not aware if the eyeAF triggers a spot meter at the eye or whereve the current flexible spot point is at.

Honestly, I used EyeAF on the A7RII for a long time without any special metering related to it.

Most of my EyeAF is for catalog work which involved setting manual shutter speed to 1/160 second and apertures of either f/2.8, f/5.6 or f/8 depending on the shot and how many models were present. ISO is always 100 because I use fill flash to illuminate the subject. The metering would control TTL power level on the flash and every now and then I might have to bump flash comp up or down, but it was mostly a no brainer.

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eye-AF and metering mode question

Sakisf

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