I'm another casualty of Jack's H50 thread. Literally within days of replacing my 8 year old Cyber Shot with a W300, I was feeling the effects of the first hand experience(s) shared within that dreaded thread. :lol:

Having yet another new toy to understand, I grabbed the new-to-me H50 as my family and I headed out to watch a Japanese drum program at our local college campus. We were greeted with a sign as soon as we entered that read : "No photography please."

Great.

Myself, being the retentive soul that I am asked an attendant if that meant "no photos", or merely "no flash photography". I was assured it meant no cameras. Period. I walked in with my mono-pod and camera bag anyway.

At the beginning of the program, there was an announcement stating that picture taking is allowed w/o the use of flash. GREAT!! I wasted no time getting things set up. I used the screen to get the initial setting I wanted to start within manual mode set, then with respect to those behind me, I turned it off and used the viewfinder afterward. Starting with high ISO, it became very apparent I needed to start dialing in things -which made for a very good lesson in what does what.

However.......................and this is what I'm blaming Jack for: when changing to portrait mode....................let's just say the actual intensity of the on-board flashwasn't covered in nearly enough depth. :shock:

It fired.

Very brightly I might add.

Only one pic was taken on portrait before I quickly switched back to manual mode. After this self-inflicted embarrassment, I noticed someone off to my left had followed my lead........................then another to my right. I remember checking my counter at 97 pictures right before I was tapped on the shoulder. Somewhere in the darkness behind me, a very official sounding voice sounded, "Sir, I'm going toask to to refrain from taking any more pictures."

Now, I'm not 100% certain if it was because I was spending more time looking through the viewfinder then actually enjoying the program, or if those entitled had merely concentrated their efforts in locating the source of the first, full auditorium, light show and blamed the other strobes on the guy with the camera on a stickor what the reasoning was. Bottom line is, I got myself"photoflagged"......................at a show that really wasn't that good.

I have afew pics to weed through, then I'll post a few "attempts".

The next step.

Processed 90+ pictures last evening. One detail became very apparent -out of all the shots taken in burst mode, not a single one came out in focus. There were a few that showed an attempt (never on the actual subject framed) and some that just flat out weren't worth the time.

The bracketed pictures were a 1 in 3 salvage - which was discussedin another thread, so it was expected. What was interesting is I could follow the focal adjustments from pic to pic. The first in the series would be focused in the center of the pic; the second pic would add focus on the left of the frame; and the final in the series would produce a crisp focus throughout the frame.

The portrait pic mentioned in the above post.......................garbage.

Hopefully I'll have time to host some pics tonight. (PP took much longer then expected)

Zig-

I own both the Panasonic FZ-28 and the Sony H-50. My big complaint with the H-50 is that I am never quite sure where it is actually focusing. An then when it does fous, that focus can be pretty soft. The H-50 is a capable camera, but IMO somewhat unpredictable as to exactly where it does indeed focus.

Here is a no flash/existing light photo from the H-50 that is reasonably good. On the other hand, Iam able to know exactly where the FZ-28 is going to focus. The result, I use the FZ-28 much more than the H-50 camera.

Sarah Joyce

Zig-

In all fairness I think I should also post a photo sample from the same show using the FZ-28. So here is the FZ-28 photo.

Sarah Joyce

Here's what the camera did in my hands (note I'm not blaming the camera).

Full stage from our spot 22 rows back:



A few candids

1)



(2)



(3)



Something I wish to learn:



Is there a way with this P-n-S to stop the movement of the drum sticks while maintaining full focus under existing light?

Full view shot was 1/60, 4.5, 400

Candids at 1/80, 4.5, 400

Zig-

Your photos look pretty good. The best way to stop action is to use the high ISO Mode on the Mode Selector. That will increase the ISO used, which in turn will invrease the shutter speed used in the photo.

The H-50 is quite capable of using more than ISO 400 which you used. Here is a H-50 sample photo where the ISO used was 640 and the shutter speed was 1/100th. Because the ISO was increased you also got an increased shutter speed which stopped the action.

Sarah Joyce

so are you saying that on p mode the flash always flashes? i just got back from my daughters Xmas concert in a dark theater and i had my H50 in P mode and no flash with mine, pictures came out great and even had to use full zoom

Thank you mtclimber!

However, I now have more questions.

First, how did you set the H50 to an ISO 640?

I have AUTO, 80, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, and 3200 as options both in manual mode and Shutter Priority mode. (I can set shutter to 640 - not ISO.)

Second, is there possibly a limit in the amount of movement the faster shutter speed will stop in low light? If I recall correctly, and I was tinkering with settings to get a feel for them, I was limited to the shutter speed and ISO setting in order to gain enough light without passing the point of over-exposure.

Make any sense, or am I too far removed from reality? :O:-)

Canadian wrote: No, P mode is Program mode - I was dialed to the Portrait setting (two people - one white/one outlined on the dial), hoping for a crisp subject with a blurred backround.

Which, in trying to fully understand this camera, I have come to the conclusion it was completely operator error as I haven't been able to duplicate the situation since. Only theory that fits is that my sausage link for a finger had to get against the dial and put enough pressure on it to flip from "flash off" to "flash auto".



Live and learn.

Zig-

The drums situation shown in your posted photos, where flash was prohibited, was a situation that called for the use of the High ISO Mode. When you are in the High ISO Mode, the camera is selecting the ISO setting for each and every photo, based on the amount of light in the photo scene. Therefore, you will observe that the H-50 will select ISO settings that are not even listed on the possible ISO settings that you can manually select.

As you can see from my posted photos, the High ISO Mode does work quite well on the H-50 in a situation where the flash cannot be used. Selecting the Portrait Mode did not at all address the lighting conditions that you needed. The Portrait Mode detected that you were in a low light level environment, and therefore turned the flash on and used it.

The bottom line analysis is this: You have to select the correct mode to use in any situation. You could have alsohandled the drums situation in the P for Program Mode, by usinga manually selected ISO setting. However, the quickest solution was to use the High ISO Mode.

Sarah Joyce