Fuji X camera settings help needed

273K

Need help with a minor but frustrating niggle with my X-E2.

For general use, particularly when trying to get shots away quickly when out and about, or of moving subjects, I have the camera set to shutter priority, usually somewhere around 1/250 or so to try to avoid movement blur. The camera automatically sets the ISO and aperture.

However, in doing so it tends to keep the ISO low as possible and open the aperture, so I’ll end up with 1/250s, ISO200, f2 when I’d much prefer, say, 1/250s, ISO 1600, f5.6. In other words I’d rather have a bigger DOF than low ISO. In these situations I don’t want to use aperture priority and risk the shutter speed going too low. Is there some setting to get it to do this? I can’t seem to find anything in the menus.

I know I can work around it by manually adjusting ISO or aperture as well as shutter speed, but I find this is too tricky to do quickly enough for many situations. Thinking about it I’m not sure what it does first in aperture priority mode - raise ISO or lower shutter speed - I think it’s the former, but I’ll check it out later. It has the latest firmware installed, and it might be my imagination but I don’t think it always did this!

newbie1

Do you have the option of auto ISO in manual mode?

273K

Manual mode, as in setting aperture and shutter speed myself? I find doing that to be a bit slow but yes auto ISO is an option for that, and usually what I resort through when shutter priority's not giving me the settings I want.

snerkler

TBH I'm pretty sure this is how all cameras work, ISO is the last thing it will adjust. Same as aperture priority mode, it will decrease shutter speed first and when that reaches the minimum (which you can usually set in the menus) it will then adjust ISO

It shouldn't be any slower than shutter priority. Set shutter to 1/250, aperture to f5.6 (or whatever) and then fire away, you don't have to touch settings again as the camera will take care of the exposure due to Auto ISO.

If you have custom modes you can even set one of these up as this so you can be even lazier and don't have to set either shutter or aperture. Save your settings (1/250, f5.6, ISO Auto) to say custom 1 and then all you have to do in future is rotate the dial to custom 1, or choose custom 1 from a menu if that's how your camera works.

I rarely use shutter priority for this reason, I usually want control of shutter and aperture, but I'm usually the other way to you, I want the aperture as wide as possible

AMc

FWIW and I know this isn't a popular opinion on photography forums but this isn't TP so I doubt I'll need a flameproof suit...
I use P for almost everything I shoot, I leave ISO on auto with a limit of 3200.  A quick spin of main adjustment dial will select a combination of shutter/aperture/ISO that will result in a reasonably exposed image.  
In general I tend to use the settings the camera has chosen and if I know I need to deliberately under or over expose then I use the exposure compensation dial to go up or down a stop or so.  My camera will cycle the aperture and shutter alternately before it strays into increasing the ISO for exposure compensation.

Under certain circumstances - night city shots etc. - then I'll fix the ISO at 200, let the camera choose the shutter/aperture and see if I think it's possible to take the image.

If I'm really slowing down and I want to isolate the subject from the background or get the maximum depth of focus, then I'll put the camera into A and be a bit more careful with everything but it's rare.  
If I'm shooting something I know is fast moving (odd motorsport event) then I'll use S and pick a shutter speed and leave the rest to the camera.

I take pictures when I go out - I rarely go out to take pictures as a goal.  
I'm usually with other people and so worrying about composition, focus and having the horizon level-ish is enough.  In my heart I know I should be caring more about the settings but as a default I find P mode with a tweak of exposure compensation gives me results I'm happy.

I know some other photographers who leave their cameras set in full auto mode for grab shots.

snerkler

I don't use P mode as P's for pros innit

273K

Thanks, yeh, in general I'd also go for wide aperture when I have time to focus accurately, or just genrally use A-priority. But when I'm trying to get a shot away quickly, my logic is first to avoid motion blur, then go for reasonable Dof as insurance in case autofocus picks the wrong subject, then worry about ISO. However the camera tends to switch the latter two. I'd prefer it to say "what's the highest aperture I can get away with for this shutter speed". Obviously I can do this myself given time but when I'm trying to be quick it would help if it was automatic.

If it's the same for all cameras maybe I'm asking a bit too much from the camera, to be honest, though I find this one the best to use in this respect compared to others I've tried in the past, even though it's not perfect I like everything else about it maybe it's as good as I'll get. I

Good point, I do sometimes go out to take pictures as a goal and in those cases I'm more deliberate in planning and generally have an idea of settings in mind beforehand, and have time on my hands to play around.
It's really the second case - taking pictures while I happen to be out - that I'm trying to improve. Both P-mode and full auto or something like (1/250, f5.6) mentioned above works a lot of the time. But it occasionally lets me down, say if going indoors from bright sunlight, or vice versa. I'm not mindful enough to think ahead as I change environments and then the time it takes to change settings which occasionally catches me out as I miss a grab shot. I guess I need to work out which of these works best for me as a 'set and forget' option and then get quicker at making adjustments.

snerkler

I'm still not sure why you're against manual mode though with auto ISO though, it does everything that you want and takes no time at all?

273K

Haha, no, nothing against it at all! My 'default' S&A setting is usually somewhere around what you said with auto ISO. Sometimes I'll end up with a shot focused on the wrong place with low ISO and think, hm, maybe with more Dof and a higher ISO it might have turned out ok? Like I said it's just a minor niggle, not really a big deal at all, just something that I ponder occasionally.

reecie

Does the XE3 have the three auto iso settings? If so just follow this Fujifilm X Settings: What is AUTO ISO and When to Use It and see if that helps