On Mar 9, 2005, at 10:52 PM, David Oswald wrote:
The *ist-DS has a menu setting by which the user can request that an ISO warning light up if a predetermined ISO sensitivity is exceeded. To me this feature makes a lot of sense if one is shooting in auto-ISO mode, where the camera moves up to a higher sensitivity if not enough light is available to take the shot at handheld speeds given the currently set ISO. In auto-ISO mode, it is very useful to have the little ISO light turn on in the viewfinder if the camera has chosen to set its ISO above, say, 800.
But that's not quite how it works, at least for firmware version 1.01. The ISO sensitivity warning does light up if the user manually selects an ISO that is at or above the warning level. But the warning doesn't seem to trigger if the camera's auto-ISO selects such an ISO automatically.
This seems like a nearly useless function, as it currently works. Why would I need an ISO warning to trigger when *I* set my ISO above a level that *I* predetermined to be the warning level? In my mind the only real need is to be warned when/if the camera automatically selects a high ISO. ...but as I just mentioned, that doesn't happen.
Can anyone else confirm/deny, or otherwise shed light on this quirky feature?
It works like this:
When ISO sensitivity coercion is turned on, the ISO warning is not enabled.
The ISO warning lights when you have set an ISO above the ISO Warning threshold.
The logic, I would imagine, is something like this:
If the user has turned on ISO Sensitivity Coercion, that means the user doesn't care what ISO is set in the range to the limit setting, so there's no need to turn on a warning.
If the user has turned on ISO Warning, starting at a given ISO setting, it lights in the viewfinder to remind the user that they might have set a higher than normal ISO for a particular purpose, and to be aware of it (since there is no other ISO readout without pressing the Fn or Info button).
I find this works great for me. The ISO warning illuminated in the viewfinder has let me catch myself several times where I temporarily set the camera to ISO 1600 for a brief few shots and normally want to use ISO 200-400. I don't use Sensitivity Coercion, but if I was just snap shooting I'd turn it on and leave the camera in "auto picture", who cares about warnings then?
Godfrey
