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Custom Set-Up: 3

Lesson 27 from: Sony A7 Mark II Series Fast Start

John Greengo

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Lesson Info

27. Custom Set-Up: 3

Next Lesson: Custom Set-Up: 4

Lesson Info

Custom Set-Up: 3

Working over to page three on the customs setup menu live view display, we have a setting effect on and off option, and for most of you, you're gonna want to leave this turn on. And as we saw earlier on this camera's, I was changing the shutter speeds up and down, you saw the actual image getting lighter and darker, and I think that's going to be handy for most people who wants to turn this off is a very particular type of photographer, and I am sometimes like this photographer, and that is a photographer working in the studio. And so if you are working with flash, the camera isn't going to be able to mimic what that look is until the flash actually turns on. And so if you were working in the studio or with flash equipment, you would be turning this off for most of the rest of us were probably going to appreciate to have it on because it's going to show us ah preview of what the final image is going to look like. Now we do have another setting that we're going to get to in a little bit...

it's called bright monitoring, and what it does is it boost the brightness level of your viewfinder so that you can see it more easily in sunshine or bright level viewing conditions and so it's kind of inter related, but it's in a very different area will be getting to that in a few minutes. A f area auto clear is something unique to the seven s model, and what happens is normally when you focus on a subject, it turns green and it stays there with the a seven s. If you turn on the auto clear, it'll focus on the subject, and then the focusing brackets will disappear so that you have a very clean viewfinder toe work with for focusing, which is a kind of nice option. And I think somebody who is comfortable with their camera and their focusing system and knowing that it captured the focus that they want, might want to turn that on. I think the average user might well do leave this turned off, so they always have a visual confirmation that the camera did focus in on what subject on the r and the seven, but not the ass model. The continuous autofocus area will show you in these little green boxes as the subject is tracking the subject. You may remember the video of caitlin running up on the hill in downtown seattle, there where the boxes were following her as she was running, and this is where the camera will show you what the camera is focusing on. And so I think for anybody new to this camera, I would highly recommend turning this on if you've had it for a while, you may find it a little irritating and you've grown more accustomed to how the camera works and a little bit more trustworthy and you know that it's doing the thing and you don't need to see it in the viewfinder yourself, but I think keeping it on it first as you learn the system is going to be very helpful face detection area is simply going to show us where the camera has its phase detection points, and if you recall let's, just go ahead back to that slide where it shows you. The a seven r has that huge three hundred ninety nine point array, which is covering forty five percent of the sensor, which is actually sixty seven percent of the coverage area, which is huge for a camera. And so, um, you can leave this turned on and we'll show you in brackets now they a seven mark too doesn't have his big of area where those face detection marks are. Do you want those brackets in the frame? And so I think this is something most people can learn fairly quickly and you probably don't need to leave turned on may want to if you're if you're still learning the system now, these face detection do not work when you get below faa so once you're at f nine eleven sixteen twenty two and so forth the face detection areas are not picking up enough light to do you any good and so you do need to have a little bit brighter lenses but this is uh and this also applies to where your aperture is set when you are shooting because muralist cameras have different ways of working and one of the things about this camera is that it when you set the aperture it sets the aperture right then and there it doesn't wait to shoot a photo with it and so I'm going to see if we can do a little live demo here and in this case I need to point the camera directly at the other camp olympics next door and get this pointed here right in the lock us in and so we're going to see and I don't know if we're gonna be able to do this or not not sure if this is gonna work let's see if this works better here maybe here and I'm going to change the aperture and I don't know if we're going to be able to see in the viewfinder not this was untested in pre shell okay can you let's see I guess I gotta have the lens back here and so you can see if let's see how you get it we're just getting some funny reflections on their tryingto and so, as I change the aperture on the lands it's actually changing in here, and so when I said an aperture of f eleven it's actually setting the camera f eleven and that face detection is no longer working now, thankfully, when you shoot sports, you're needing faster shutter speeds, you're probably opening the aperture tohave to aid or four or five six it be rare that you go beyond it, but the camera is not as good at focusing when you stopped that aperture down. So just be aware, it's when a little quirks about how the camera works soas faras setting the face detection area if you want to set it on it's going to show you that in a bracket area pre auto focus is kind of an interesting thing, and it took me a little while to kind of really dial in what's going on here, and so what happens is, as you pick the camera up and bring it up to your eye, it knows I'm switching to the viewfinder. Let me try to focus for you, and so any time you pick it up a new time and try to point the camera something, it'll automatically pick up and start to focus to try to give you a head start even before you press halfway down on the shutter release. Now for somebody who's worked with the camera and they don't want it to focus or change focus every time they pick it up you're probably gonna want to turn this off just get used to pressing halfway down is what most people have done. There might be some areas where it will speed up the focusing process, but I think they're relatively few and far between the zoom setting on this and so on this one once again, sony likes to go in and digitally manipulate your images from time to time, and we have that zoom setting. We talked about this earlier where the camera will digitally zoom in for us, and we can choose whether to use this on optical zoom or clear image zoom or digital zoom. Now the difference now optical zoom is the actual zooming of the lance clear image and digital zoom are exactly the same thing the difference is clearing exume does one to two times magnification and digital zoom does one, two, four times magnification. And so how we doing on time? We're doing okay on time, so let's do another little demo here, so I'm going to throw the camera back in the program mode, turn the camera on let's, go into the menu system, we're going to have to make a couple of changes here where are we? We are doing the zooming thing we can't do the zoom setting it's great out every once in a while something is going to be great out. Yeah, as much as I like to gripe about the sony menu system, here is one thing that they have gotten right that nobody else has gotten right I got something I can't set on here, why can't I said it? I pressed the set button and it tells me what I have to change in order to do this so we can't do this and raw, so I need to go back into raw and I'm going to shoot this at extra fine quality actually I'm going to go down to fine actually that doesn't matter this one, I'm going to shoot at medium quality and now we're going to rush back over to our zoom setting there's a resumes I didn't see it's no longer great out and I am going to set it on clear image zoom because that's going to allow me to zoom mohr and now all I need to do is actually turn on the zoom setting this is setting where it's going to be at if I turn it on, I forget where it is, but I remember it was back here we talked about a little bit earlier, there it is zoom setting, page six we're gonna go ahead and zoom now now we have a physical zoom lens that we consume back and forth, but I am now going to perform a digital zoom. You guys ready? Here we go, we're digitally zooming in on it wasn't that exciting, and so I don't know why it's only going to three point one and not for it. Maybe I might need a small j peg. And so if you wanted to zoom very smoothly, you could do it here. Let's, try this. I'm going to go back. Tio my duty to lips. I went too far, went too far. I'm going to change my image size too small, which means I'll be able to zoom in even further. But I have to go back to the zoom setting. Where was that? Assume. Steadiness right here. Okay, now, let's, see how close we can zoom in. So now we can get into the full four point. Oh, zoom and we can shoot photos here. They're going to be very small in resolution. Okay. All right, most of you saying I'm not going to use this feature, but it doesn't that's how it works. And so if you were going to shoot smaller, medium sized j pegs that's, how it work.

Class Materials

Bonus Materials with Purchase

Sony® A7II Info and Menu List
Sony® A7RII info and Menu List
Sony® A7SII Info and Menu List

Ratings and Reviews

a Creativelive Student
 

INCREDIBLE Class! I couldn't find anything on the internet that truly explained this camera, explained what it can and can't do and what accessories would work with it. I have had my Sony A7II for awhile now, but was so overwhelmed by it, I rarely even took it out of its case. It was just easier to use my Canon 5D III. After this class, I am so excited to finally practice with and use my Sony. John is an incredible teacher. He is thorough, professional, fun and knowledgeable! Buying this class was the best investment!!! I feel like I just got the gift of a new camera because I can finally use my Sony!!! Thanks John and Thanks Creative Live!!!

Enrique Vega es
 

I stored my Sony A7II for more than a year since I've been Canon's user for 7 years and I felt unsure of taking this new camera which implied a different menu system, different functions, a little bit intimidating. Finally, I took a bit of valor, put my camera next to the computer monitor for then start watching this guide and I spent a great time actually. I'm amazed at how helpful and clear is the sequence of the chapters. It was enough to get to chapter ten to know all the basic controls and start taking pictures with an equivalent confidence of my good old Canon, or even better since in the chapter 8th I learned how accurate and easy to use is the focusing system, either, manual or auto (For stills I've always used manual focusing). Very informative, enjoyable and now I became a new fan of the mirrorless cameras, at the point that I'm considering to buy another two :D

VeraInAlbania
 

John is an excellent teacher! In fact his Fundamentals of Digital Photography 2014 was the first ever class I watched on CreativeLive, and since then I'm in love with his teaching style as well as with CreativeLive! I bought my Sony A7II in March 2015 and when I found out that John is giving a class on it I was very excited! As I expected I learnt many secrets about my camera which I had been using for 9 months already. For example about the option of focusing on the eyes, setting the buttons, making panoramas etc. The camera is still smarter than me I must admit. I am enjoying my Sony even more now since after the class I feel much more confident. Thank you John and CreativeLive for such an opportunity! I would recommend to everyone who has a Sony a7II camera and the other cameras in this line to watch this class. It's a concentrate of useful information, very detailed and to the point. I spent two days just watching the class and practicing new knowledge with my camera straight away. I had to postpone all the other life chores. And I would be ready to watch the class again after some time as it's a professional camera which needs a lot of practice!

Student Work

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