why is the shutter speed so fast when taking indoor low light pics?

I just got a chance to start shooting some test pics with my cp990 tonight, and I took some random low to medium light indoor shots, using 'Auto' mode.

one thing i noticed, as soon as I have the object focused and ready to shoot, my shutter speed jumps up to 1/125!!! and the pic comes out horribly underexposed and awful looking.

Why is that? with my cp950 doing the same shot in auto mode, the camera would automatically select 1/60 or 1/30 and the shots would come out looking a lot better.

Sometimes I just dont want to fuss with the manual mode, and I just want to take some pics.

Stan C. said:

I just got a chance to start shooting some test pics with my cp990
tonight, and I took some random low to medium light indoor shots,
using 'Auto' mode.

one thing i noticed, as soon as I have the object focused and ready
to shoot, my shutter speed jumps up to 1/125!!! and the pic comes
out horribly underexposed and awful looking.

Why is that? with my cp950 doing the same shot in auto mode, the
camera would automatically select 1/60 or 1/30 and the shots would
come out looking a lot better.

Sometimes I just dont want to fuss with the manual mode, and I just
want to take some pics.

Click to expand...

The 990 uses 1/125 (actually something like 1/111) for the flash. The 950 used showed 1/30 on the screen but used 1/60. Try turning off the flash. You aren't mentioning the flash firing, so I'm guessing that you are in one of the modes where the internal flash is disabled but the external is still enabled like continuous mode.
Try this,

• Set single shot mode.
• Turn off the flash with the button at the bottom of the LCD.

Then it will use longer exposures
Bryan

Actually, i'm just using the auto mode everything.. Auto flash. I reckon if I disabled the flash, it would look more horrible.

Then only way I could get my shot to look ok, is if I use manual mode, ISO200, 1/30 shutter speed. then the shot will look just ok.

Bryan Biggers said:

Stan C. said:

I just got a chance to start shooting some test pics with my cp990
tonight, and I took some random low to medium light indoor shots,
using 'Auto' mode.

one thing i noticed, as soon as I have the object focused and ready
to shoot, my shutter speed jumps up to 1/125!!! and the pic comes
out horribly underexposed and awful looking.

Why is that? with my cp950 doing the same shot in auto mode, the
camera would automatically select 1/60 or 1/30 and the shots would
come out looking a lot better.

Sometimes I just dont want to fuss with the manual mode, and I just
want to take some pics.

Click to expand...

The 990 uses 1/125 (actually something like 1/111) for the flash.
The 950 used showed 1/30 on the screen but used 1/60. Try turning
off the flash. You aren't mentioning the flash firing, so I'm
guessing that you are in one of the modes where the internal flash
is disabled but the external is still enabled like continuous mode.
Try this,

• Set single shot mode.
• Turn off the flash with the button at the bottom of the LCD.

Then it will use longer exposures
Bryan

Click to expand...

What subject were you shooting?
Was it beyond the range of the flash? ISO200 will help the
flash reach further, but the shutter speed is, for all intents
and purposes, irrelevant for low light indoor shots using
the flash.

Have you checked that your flash power setting is normal? It
could be down at -2.0 which would underexpose all
flash shots. If, for some reason the flash isn't
fiiring, try forcing it on.

ian

Stan C. said:

Then only way I could get my shot to look ok, is if I use manual
mode, ISO200, 1/30 shutter speed. then the shot will look just ok.

Bryan Biggers said:

Stan C. said:

I just got a chance to start shooting some test pics with my cp990
tonight, and I took some random low to medium light indoor shots,
using 'Auto' mode.

one thing i noticed, as soon as I have the object focused and ready
to shoot, my shutter speed jumps up to 1/125!!! and the pic comes
out horribly underexposed and awful looking.

Why is that? with my cp950 doing the same shot in auto mode, the
camera would automatically select 1/60 or 1/30 and the shots would
come out looking a lot better.

Sometimes I just dont want to fuss with the manual mode, and I just
want to take some pics.

Click to expand...

The 990 uses 1/125 (actually something like 1/111) for the flash.
The 950 used showed 1/30 on the screen but used 1/60. Try turning
off the flash. You aren't mentioning the flash firing, so I'm
guessing that you are in one of the modes where the internal flash
is disabled but the external is still enabled like continuous mode.
Try this,

• Set single shot mode.
• Turn off the flash with the button at the bottom of the LCD.

Then it will use longer exposures
Bryan

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

I was shooting my a pic of my girlfriend in front of a white wall.

Where is the flash power setting?

The flash does fire fine, just under auto mode, everything seems underexposed.

Thanks

ian said:

Have you checked that your flash power setting is normal? It
could be down at -2.0 which would underexpose all
flash shots. If, for some reason the flash isn't
fiiring, try forcing it on.

ian

Stan C. said:

Then only way I could get my shot to look ok, is if I use manual
mode, ISO200, 1/30 shutter speed. then the shot will look just ok.

Bryan Biggers said:

Stan C. said:

I just got a chance to start shooting some test pics with my cp990
tonight, and I took some random low to medium light indoor shots,
using 'Auto' mode.

one thing i noticed, as soon as I have the object focused and ready
to shoot, my shutter speed jumps up to 1/125!!! and the pic comes
out horribly underexposed and awful looking.

Why is that? with my cp950 doing the same shot in auto mode, the
camera would automatically select 1/60 or 1/30 and the shots would
come out looking a lot better.

Sometimes I just dont want to fuss with the manual mode, and I just
want to take some pics.

Click to expand...

The 990 uses 1/125 (actually something like 1/111) for the flash.
The 950 used showed 1/30 on the screen but used 1/60. Try turning
off the flash. You aren't mentioning the flash firing, so I'm
guessing that you are in one of the modes where the internal flash
is disabled but the external is still enabled like continuous mode.
Try this,

• Set single shot mode.
• Turn off the flash with the button at the bottom of the LCD.

Then it will use longer exposures
Bryan

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Stan C. said:

I was shooting my a pic of my girlfriend in front of a white wall.

Where is the flash power setting?

The flash does fire fine, just under auto mode, everything seems
underexposed.

Thanks

Click to expand...

Ah. OK you ARE using the flash then.

Couple of things.

1) The shutter speed does not affect flash exposure. The flash duration is a lot shorter than the fastest shutter speed on the camera. You will get the same result at 1/500 vs 1/125, for example.

2) The white wall is the problem. The 990 uses the small sensor next to the lens to look at the scene and decide when it is properly exposed. This is an average over the entire visible portion of the scene. In the case of someone against a white wall, most of the reflected light is from the wall, and the camera mostly exposes the wall correctly, which underexposes your subject. You have to add some + flash compensation in this case, just as you would if you were shooting a subject that was heavily backlit outdoors in the sun.

3) The opposite can also happen, person close to the camera in a big room that the flash can't light. Since most of the light returning to the camera is from the person, the camera overexposes the person trying to get the proper average amount of light over the whole scene.

Bryan