6 --> Center Lock-On AF is OFF. Is that tiny AF point (from either “Spot” or “Flexible Spot” above) too small to do the job? Then Sony has given you “Expand Flexible Spot” which makes the AF area larger. Technically, the camera will try to use the centermost point for autofocus; and if it can’t lock onto anything it will then try to use the surrounding area to find focus.
TIP: It’s not documented anywhere, but while you’re moving the flexible spot, pressing the C2 button will reset the focus point to the very center. While this is good to know, it also means that when you’re in move-your-focus-point-around mode, whatever you have assigned to C2 won’t work until you hit the center button (confirming the focus point position). |
This is a newer and easier-to-invoke version of Center Lock-On AF (originally described in Section 3.7). It’s better because you’re not restricted to the center and, once set, you don’t have to press any buttons to invoke it. It works automatically and invisibly.
Basically, you just set your focusing point, press the shutter release button halfway, and immediately after the camera does a focus-lock it will start to track what it thinks is the subject as it wanders slowly across the viewfinder.
Here’s how to use it:
1) Make sure you have a native E-mount lens attached. (This won't work with legacy glass).
2) Ironically, you have to make sure that MENU --> 6 --> Center Lock-On AF is OFF.
3) Go to the Focus Area menu either through the Fn button or via MENU --> 3 --> Focus Area and navigate to the 6th option, “Lock-On AF”.
4) You can use the Left and Right arrow buttons to choose your AF area: Wide, Zone, Center, Flexible Spot (L, M, or S) or Expanded Flexible Spot – all of these options were described in the previous 5 sections.
From that point on, pressing the shutter release button halfway will focus on whatever’s behind the selected focus point, and then the camera will instantly go into Lock-On AF tracking mode and try to track the object as it moves slowly throughout the scene.
The best part about this is that Face Detection still works in this mode, and again, this is an ideal mode when shooting the kids who never stay still.
TIP 1: Unlike Center Lock-On AF, Lock-on AF cannot be used for video. TIP 2: All these different focusing modes can get confusing to many people. When the Sony A7R II came out, I made a video which gives a more intuitive feel for what all the different functions do. The points in this video apply equally well to the A6300. So if you find the focusing mode choices confusing, this video might make it clearer: https://youtu.be/4wSHBVFG6m4 (And keep in mind I was drugged up on cold medicine when I made that video. :-) ) |
Menu Position MENU --> 
3 --> AF Illuminator
What it Does Specifies whether the camera should invoke its AF Assist light when trying to focus in dark rooms
Recommended Setting: Auto, unless you don’t want to call attention to yourself at a party
Your camera has the ability to focus in complete darkness, thanks its built-in red/orange LED. This function can tell the camera it has the option of using this focusing aid when the light gets too low (AUTO), or not (OFF).
So if this focus-assist mechanism is so useful, why on earth would you want to turn it off? Well, that light does call attention to itself (and to you!), plus it can add a second or two to the total focusing time. If you’re not in total darkness and your subject does have enough contrast, the camera might still be able to find focus on its own – it’s actually quite sensitive. At least you have the AF illuminator option as a safety net for totally dark environments.
This focus-assist beam is very useful and accurate, but is only good for subjects that are about 10 feet away or so. (Oh, and this light doubles as the self-timer countdown light. But you probably already figured that out.)
If you're shooting with a long lens, the lens or its lens shade might block the light from hitting your subject. If this happens, try removing the lens hood and maybe zoom out a little.
Restrictive TIP: The AF Illuminator function will NOT work if the camera is set to AF-C (continuous AF mode, Section 6.14), nor in a handful of Scene modes (specifically Landscape, Night Scene, or Sports Action. I can’t explain all of these restrictions.) TIP 2: When it’s dark and the AF Illuminator function is enabled, the camera will ignore the current focusing area and lock onto whatever it can instead, regardless of where it is in the frame. In this situation the entire Live View area will be outlined with a green dotted rectangle when the camera thinks focus has been achieved. TIP 3: The AF Illuminator will only operate when a native E-mount lens is attached. |
Menu Position MENU --> 4 --> AF Drive Speed
What it Does When shooting video, do you want a slow AF that doesn't call much attention to itself, or a fast that might be visually distracting
Recommended Setting: It depends, but "Normal" is a good general purpose setting.
Constraints Phase detect AF only; native E-mount lenses only.
Videographers care about this. (Well, the ones that REALLY care will pull focus manually to suit their needs. It's the others that care about this.) But for the rest of us we can choose between smooth transitions (like when panning a landscape slowly) or slightly more jarring autofocus (like when shooting sports).
The best way to undstand what this function does is to try it: set up two subjects, one close and one far, and then point the camera from one to the other, and watch how much time it takes for the camera to achieve focus. Now try this for all three settings.
TIP: Some older APS-C E-mount lenses cannot accept phase detect control commands, and therefore features like AF Drive Speed, AF Track Sens (next section), or AF-A focusing mode are disallowed. |
Menu Position MENU --> 4 --> AF Track Sens
What it Does Tells the camera how aggressive it should be in tracking moving subjects in movie mode
Recommended Setting High, unless you're shooting sports
Constraints Phase detect AF only; E-mount lenses only
You can see just what this feature does by doing a quick test:
When set to “Normal”, this feature can be useful in sports events where the main person holding the ball will periodically have people running in front of them, and you don’t want the camera’s AF to be so easily distracted. (Like in this video: https://youtu.be/VURpvtULGgE .) In all other situations I keep this set to “High”.
TIP 1: Speaking of focusing during movies, while shooting movies you can focus-lock using the currently selected focus area by pressing the shutter release button halfway. The focus will remain locked until you take your finger off the shutter release. Most Sony cameras don't do this. TIP 2: Older APS-C E-mount lenses (like the kind that were released with the original NEX 3 and 5) cannot accept phase detect control commands, and therefore features like AF Drive Speed (previous section), AF Track Sens, or AF-A focusing mode may be disallowed. |
Menu Position MENU --> 4 --> Exposure Comp.
What it Does Makes the picture lighter or darker
Recommended Setting: Zero, unless you need to override the camera’s choice to achieve the image you’ve pre-conceived in your mind.
The automatic exposure function (in all cameras) does a great job metering for average subjects, but they have no idea at all if your subject is whitish or darkish, or if your lighting isn’t average. All exposure meters of all cameras have been programmed to provide an exposure that would be correct for an “average” scene – that is, a scene that is made up mostly of grays and colors that are not predominantly white or black. There are many things you can do to override the meter’s recommendation (such as spot metering, AEL, and manual exposure mode). Probably the most straightforward of all of these is the exposure compensation function, which essentially tells the camera “Make it Darker!” or “Make it Lighter!” You can actually specify an exposure compensation of +/- 5 stops in stills mode (+/- 3 stops in movie mode).
|
Figure 6-24: I’ve assigned Exposure Compensation to the control dial for ease of access (see Section 7.36). |
There are three different ways to adjust the Exposure Compensation on this camera:
7 --> Dial/Wheel EV Comp --> 
DialA good example of its use appears in Figure 6-25.
|
Figure 6-25: An example of where exposure compensation comes in handy. Automatic exposure works great for average images, but if your image isn’t average (like in a dark clearing, left image) the camera is likely to over-expose the picture in its quest to render the scene as “average”. You can override the camera’s recommendation and use Exposure Compensation to make it darker or lighter (in this case a setting of “-1” made it one stop darker, closer to the way it actually looked). (I also changed the color balance to Daylight to make it look the way my eyes saw it.) Good thing you have Live View for instant feedback! |
Don’t forget to reset this feature back to +/- 0 when you’re finished – this camera can remember your exposure compensation setting even when you turn the camera off.
TIP: You can adjust the exposure in either 1/3rd stop increments or ½ stop increments, depending upon the setting of MENU --> |
Menu Position MENU --> 4 --> Exposure Step
What it Does Lets you specify whether you “dial in” exposure compensation and flash compensation values in ½-stop increments (0.5 EV), or 1/3rd of a stop increments (0.3 EV) when changing values via the menu. It also dictates which in-between shutter speeds you can select in Shutter Priority and Manual Exposure modes.
Recommended Setting 0.3 EV, only because I find that two of these steps (+0.7 EV) is an ideal bracketing amount for digital cameras, and you can’t dial that in when the Exposure Step is set to 0.5.
When you change the Exposure Compensation setting (either via the menu or when assigned to a dial), each click of the wheel/dial can either represent ½ stop in either direction, or it can represent 1/3rd of a stop in either direction depending upon the setting of this function.
Many of you may be scratching your heads, saying “The difference between ½ a stop and 1/3rd of a stop is so minute, why would you ever need to choose between one and another?” The answer is such minute differences made more sense in the days of shooting slides when tiny tweaks were meaningful.
Because 1/3rd of a stop is pretty meaningless in the age of photoshop, whenever I tweak my exposures out in the field, I usually do it 0.7 stop increments, which is the equivalent of two clicks when this variable is set to 0.3. (Remember, 0.3 is actually 0.3333333 truncated, which is why when you click it two times you get 0.6666666, or 0.7 rounded up.)
Real Emails from Real Readers: "Hi Gary. Could you please cover that it is not possible to set a shutter speed of 1/50 when the Exposure Step is set to 0.5EV, and why? The Exposure Step has to be set to 0.3 to get a shutter speed of 1/50. –Margaret" Hi, Margaret! Here's the answer: the camera's controls are rooted in the past, and in the past, mechanical shutter speeds on SLR cameras had settings that were 1 stop apart: 1/30th, 1/60th, 1/125th (close enough!), etc. Today's cameras mimic that behavior, but give you in-between shutter speeds too. The Exposure Step function specifies what fraction between the hard-coded shutter speeds the camera will perform. So when this is set to 0.5 EV the camera's shutter speed options will be (the boldfaced numbers represent the "hardcoded" shutter speeds): 1/30th 1/45th 1/60th 1/90th 1/125th … And with 0.3 (1/3rd of a stop) the progression looks like this: 1/30th 1/40th 1/50th 1/60th 1/80th 1/100th 1/125th … So while you might expect the Exposure step function to apply to Exposure Compensation values only, as you can see it applies to any setting where you can specify values of less than a stop. I hope this helps! Sincerely, Gary |
