Photoclubalpha

Bit puzzled by this, but the Programming seems flawed in some ways.

As we know it's focal length aware (which is good)
But seems overly keen to try to maintain a higher shutter speed than you probably need
For example if I shoot on the beercan with say 210mm f4/f4.5 in aperture priority the camera raises the ISO level to try to get 1/400 second shutter.
Now that might be ok if you were not using steady shot, but unfortunately it makes no difference to the ISO logic.

I think using the above settings with steady shot a more appropriate ratio would be say 1/200 second or 1 to 1. Without steady shot I think 1/400 is more than you need, unless you shake like crazy 1/300 second should do the job.

Just something I've noticed, but I'm surprised Sony has not at least adjusted the programming to account for stabilisation
I also saw Ken Rockwell's rant about P mode not using the faster aperture lenses, and he's right sure enough I mount an f1.7 of f1.8 lens and even in horribly dim light it refuses to open up beyond f2. Strange, not that I care much I rarely ever use P mode. This seems to be the same on the KM5d too.

I put the 50mm f1.7 on to the film 7 body and P mode, sure enough it opened the lens up to f1.7

I have the Nikon D5300 here and it does the same - at 200mm, it raises the auto ISO to keep the shutter speed at 1/320th. What I find really strange is that an auto ISO flash shot, indoors at f/5.6 and very close (head shot of cat!) was set to ISO 2800. ISO 100 would have been quite OK!

David

I am also puzzled by the Nikon way of handling auto ISO....Canon has a better way and now comes A7

Maybe I'm wrong but it seems to me that auto ISO ought to take 3rd place to auto shutter and auto aperture. For example, in A mode it should auto shutter to an acceptable speed and then auto iso to compensate. Or if in S mode it should auto aperture then auto iso. It sounds like what's going is that the ISO is taking 1st place in the priority. I quit using auto ISO a couple years back and so I'm not familiar with what my camera might do with auto iso. I could take some test shots, but alas, I'm to lazy.

I have only used auto ISO very occasionally on my A-37/57, but like you not for a long time. I get very pleasing results using a fixed ISO, usually 100-400 range and programme mode. I still have control over shutter speed and aperture. I also use AP quite a lot and mostly manual focus with the aid of focus peaking. I normally leave DRO on auto and tweak the colour temp as I find the pics a tad too warm, I've managed to get a pictures now that are very reminiscent of Kodak Portra/Kodachrome 64 which is very pleasing. I never achieved that with Canikon.
Happy New Year to all.