Manual settings for whale watching

[quack2]

What settings do you experts like to use for shooting whales?  Shutter speed vs. depth of field?.  Uncertainty of where to focus when you don't know where the subject will be?  Continuous shooting?  ISO?  I'm just getting to know my Canon 70D better and am thinking ahead to my Alaska cruise in June.

[TheOldBear]

Why manual?

 

When there is uncontrolled variability, some auto mode would make sense. 

 

There are multiple motions to consider - you, the ship or small boat, the ocean surface & the whale. Image stabilization only compensates for camera movement [you and the ship] but can be useful.

 

Will you subjects be distant [shooting from the ship] or closer [shooting from a smaller 'whale watch' excursion boat]?? What angle of view - close up / wide angle; distant telephoto?

Are your available lenses fast [f4 or smaller] or typical 'kit' lenses [f5.6 or higher]?

 

I would tend to use:

• RAW format [allow maximum manipulation if the rest of the settings go astray]
• Auto ISO
• Programed Exposure - keep an eye on what the auto camera settings are, and work to select the proper shutter speed / aperture pair from the program's settings - In P mode, one dial will adjust the program changing both the shutter speed and aperture keeping the exposure constant.
• Single point AF, in the middle of the frame [not continuous / tracking focus]

 

If you want to stop motion, you will need a fast shutter speed - 1/500 or faster. If you want a deliberate blur you can go slower [how slow depends on a multitude of variables].

 

If you camera has exposure compensation, you may need to adjust that depending on the prevailing background brightness - e.g. the camera will try to render an expanse of sunlit snow as 18% neutral grey instead of bright white.

[pierces]

2 hours ago, quack2 said:

What settings do you experts like to use for shooting whales?  Shutter speed vs. depth of field?.  Uncertainty of where to focus when you don't know where the subject will be?  Continuous shooting?  ISO?  I'm just getting to know my Canon 70D better and am thinking ahead to my Alaska cruise in June.

 

If you have good light, Manual setting I would use would be 1/1000s at f/8 with Auto ISO to cover variances in exposure. If it is overcast, open up the aperture a little or drop the shutter speed to no less than 1/500s. Below that, you will get blur on a moving subject, especially handheld.

 

Burst shooting for sure.

 

I would continuous tracking on My A7III or A6300 but I am unfamiliar with the 70D's focusing capability. 

 

Smart Program modes are pretty good for general shooting but I find they tend to lean towards the lowest possible ISO and drop the shutter speed too low for things like a breaching whale.

 

Old Bear's suggestion for compensating for the prevailing conditions is good. I find that the camera's attempt to reach an average tends to render the ocean too light and overexposes the sky and anything that is not the deep blue sea. I usually start at -1 stop and take a few test shots to review.

 

Dave

[peety3]

21 hours ago, TheOldBear said:

Why manual?

 

When there is uncontrolled variability, some auto mode would make sense. 

 

There are multiple motions to consider - you, the ship or small boat, the ocean surface & the whale. Image stabilization only compensates for camera movement [you and the ship] but can be useful.

 

If the sun is always going to be 93 million miles away, and the whales are not likely to hide under a shade tree, what's variable here?

[peety3]

Two approaches come to mind:

 

#1: Manual. Lens aperture one stop under wide open. If the lens has variable max aperture (i.e. the text you see on the label or the filter mount says something like "f/4.5-6.3", it's VMA), one stop under what the lens can do at longest focal length. Shutter speed to 1/500th and ISO to 400. Now adjust shutter (hopefully faster) and maybe ISO (lower if you can, higher if you must) to get either a proper exposure or one where the sky retains its blue and definition (in which case you'll probably need to boost the "exposure" in post, but you'll have gorgeous skies and some latitude for faster shutter speeds which can be good).

 

#2: Aperture priority. Lens aperture one stop under wide open. ISO to 400. Exposure compensation 0 to -1 depending on your willingness to edit later and your desire for more sky detail (if the sky isn't in your shot, you obviously don't care, but it's somewhat a question of your lens choice). If the shutter isn't in the vicinity of 1/500th or faster, raise the ISO.

 

Two reasons I'm not a fan of shutter priority: "get in trouble", and "variable depth of field". It's too easy to get in trouble - if you set 1/1000th (for example), unless your camera has Auto-ISO with very good logic and you use it, you run the risk of shots that can't get enough aperture from your lens to expose properly. And if the aperture is walking all over the place, minor variations in framing/composition can result in moderate changes in what the exposure meter sees and interprets via its algorithm, and now the aperture is changing a lot, resulting in changes to the depth of field. I consider DoF to be the most artistic of the three sides of the exposure triangle, and not taking some level of control of that is just artistically a struggle for me. (There's also the notion that many lenses just aren't great optically when the aperture is wide open, so as the light gets weak, the aperture opens up, and now the image gets less sharp with more distortion. It's almost "double impacting" your pictures.)

[TheOldBear]

1 hour ago, peety3 said:

If the sun is always going to be 93 million miles away, and the whales are not likely to hide under a shade tree, what's variable here?

 

Clouds [nice dramatic, high contrast lighting]

Sun angle & compensating polarizer rotation

The background [dry land, glacier, rolling waves]

[peety3]

6 minutes ago, TheOldBear said:

 

Clouds [nice dramatic, high contrast lighting]

Sun angle & compensating polarizer rotation

The background [dry land, glacier, rolling waves]

If you're changing your shot from "all the stuff on the ground, whether wet or dry" to "I'm going to aim into the light source", then yes, you've changed what light your subject is "in". Otherwise, this is all in the same light, so if the exposure was right up front, it's still right.

[quack2]

On 3/27/2019 at 10:13 AM, pierces said:

 

If you have good light, Manual setting I would use would be 1/1000s at f/8 with Auto ISO to cover variances in exposure. If it is overcast, open up the aperture a little or drop the shutter speed to no less than 1/500s. Below that, you will get blur on a moving subject, especially handheld.

 

Burst shooting for sure.

 

I would continuous tracking on My A7III or A6300 but I am unfamiliar with the 70D's focusing capability. 

 

Smart Program modes are pretty good for general shooting but I find they tend to lean towards the lowest possible ISO and drop the shutter speed too low for things like a breaching whale.

 

Old Bear's suggestion for compensating for the prevailing conditions is good. I find that the camera's attempt to reach an average tends to render the ocean too light and overexposes the sky and anything that is not the deep blue sea. I usually start at -1 stop and take a few test shots to review.

 

Dave

Thanks.,

 

[Lindanuf]

I don’t know what experts use but I love whales and took these on a sunset cruise in Kauai.  I used auto everything because depending on which side of the boat the whales jumped on I didn’t have time to be adjusting stuff.  I was using a Nikon camera with a zoom lens, something like 55-200.  The zoom lens allows me to be looking for whales at 55, and be able to zoom in when I saw them.  I used the fastest burst mode.  I had set it to save Raw and JPEG and also bracket but that filled up the 32gig SD card and when I was deleting photos to make more room it corrupted the card beyond where any app you download to fix SD cards could fix.  I paid over $600 to to a place to recover the photos.  I no longer save to RAW, for my purposes JPEG is just fine.

[pengu1n]

On 3/28/2019 at 9:11 AM, peety3 said:

#2: Aperture priority. Lens aperture one stop under wide open. ISO to 400. Exposure compensation 0 to -1 depending on your willingness to edit later and your desire for more sky detail (if the sky isn't in your shot, you obviously don't care, but it's somewhat a question of your lens choice). If the shutter isn't in the vicinity of 1/500th or faster, raise the ISO.

 

I usually go with peety3's #2 idea, although I sometimes use auto ISO with an upper limit of 800.

[TruckerDave]

I'd just go auto iso and shutter priority at about 1/500-1/1000 (a few test shots before hand to test the light and move up or down if light becomes ad issue) and let the aperture fall where it falls. 

[quack2]

4 hours ago, TruckerDave said:

I'd just go auto iso and shutter priority at about 1/500-1/1000 (a few test shots before hand to test the light and move up or down if light becomes ad issue) and let the aperture fall where it falls. 

 

Makes sense.  Do you set a maximum ISO?

[Tourist1292]

I just bought two more batteries (4 total) and a duo charger for my Canon DSLR and I have 500GB of memory space on several SD combined. I think that should be enough for a 7 day cruise in Alaska even with some video clips.

[TruckerDave]

On 3/31/2019 at 9:33 PM, quack2 said:

 

Makes sense.  Do you set a maximum ISO?

Nope.  Partly because I don't ever remember but mostly because for something like that I would ratter just get the shot and if it has some noise so be it. I am not that big of a pixel peeper for action shots. Now if I am doing landscapes, nightspots or anything with a tripod then that's a whole different topic.  But, I like to photograph the baseball and soccer teams in charleston and some of the night shots get up there in iso (my zoom isn't a f2.4 or f4)  but the shots are useable enough for me.

[DJDiver]

We have done several whale tours as well as lots of African safaris.  I shoot with a Canon 5DM4 and Canon 1DX, but I think the 70D can do this as well:  Manual shutter speed and f-stop, with auto ISO and, when needed, exposure compensation.

 

Shutter speed is typically the limiting factor for getting sharp photos of fast moving critters.  I try to stay at 1/2000 or even faster since you never know when or where the action will occur - - so you have the movement of the boat, the whale and yourself to contend with.  Choose an f stop based on the desired depth of field, but I usually start around f/8.  Use exposure compensation when needed. 

 

This one was taken at 1/2500, f/8, ISO 2500

Edited April 8, 2019 by DJDiver