AutoETTR & Dual ISO newbie queries

[muggo]

I've just discovered ML for my 6D & am extremely impressed with the AutoETTR & Dual ISO features for my stills photography.  Congratulations to the creators on a fantastic enhancement product.
It's like quick & easy HDR but with a much smaller file size & no ghosting on action shots.

I have a few questions I'd like some help with if possible.  I have searched to see if they have been asked before, but couldn't find anything.

1/  Dual ISO is apparently only activated when required.  However, even in very bright conditions, it always seems to be on.  Not a huge problem, but can anyone tell me if the auto activation feature actually works?

2/  When importing into Lightroom, my import routine adds CA, lens profile & some clarity adjustments as a default.  Does it matter if I run cr2hdr routine before or after these adjustments?  Running after seems fine, but am I missing anything?  After cr2hdr, there's usually very little post processing required; just levels really.

3/  After cr2hdr, my shooting data (shutter, aperture, ISO, focal length, lens etc) all gets reset to f1, 1sec, 0EV.  I'd really like to retain the shooting data so I can learn what works best.  Any way to achieve this?  This is my most important query.

4/  I always use ISO100/1600 if conditions allow.  I've set mids at S/N 6 & shadows at S/N 2.  Highlight ignore is .5% & allow green clipping.  What do other 6D owners recommend with AutoETTR & Dual ISO?  I've seen a tutorial forum posting, but would appreciate some other views.  I mostly shoot daytime landscapes in wide angle.

5/  After shooting with Snap AutoISO, I've noticed that the EV value jumps up 1 stop.  Shouldn't it remain at the previous level in case I want to take another shot in similar lighting?

Thanks in advance for your advice & recommendations.   

[garry23]

@muggo

As a stills photographer, I think Auto ETTR and Dual are two killer features. The two others being Auto exposure bracketing and Raw (Ev) Spotmeter.

As for work flow, I'm mainly on a tripod.

As for settings, I always switch of S/N and delink Dual, ie I turn on Dual when I (sic) need it.

One of my favorite workflows, is to switch on the RAW (Ev) Spotmeter and set exposure for the shadows and use Auto bracketing to deal with the highlights. This way I can handle any dynamic ranger and not worry about what that range is, ie how many brackets.

If I'm using ETTR and dual this gives me a 2-3 Ev boost on DR.

Rather than drone on further here: please feel free to look at my posts on my blog, where I have reported on ML. http://photography.grayheron.net/

Cheers

Garry

PS My latest posts cover my auto landscape focus bracketing experiments, using a Lua script. BTW I'm just about to publish a revision of this script and a new script for doing simulated LEs using the FRSP feature, ie silent no shutter actions.

[muggo]

Thanks for the reply Garry

I guess you use  Live View as you use a tripod.  Most of my photos are taken while walking in the hills so a tripod isn't feasible.  Also, my girlfriend thinks we walk too slow as it is.
Some nice shots on your site.  I especially like the IR ones.
Cheers
Paul

[Audionut]

1.  Yes.

2.  Dual iso images should be processed with cr2hdr before anything else.

3.  Make sure you're using the latest version of cr2hdr.

4.  Using settings that fit the scene luminance.  I would suggest you have a clear understanding of what each setting does.  Ask specific questions if you need further help.

5.  AutoETTR works best in manual mode.

[muggo]

I've processed with cr2hdr before importing into Lightroom as recommended, using drag & drop.
The converted ones were .dng & those that weren't DualISO remained as .cr2. 
I then imported these files into LR 5.6 & applied Convert to DNG, lens profile, CA, sharpening & a very slight amount of clarity.   Lens, AV, EV, TV info etc is retained in the converted files I'm pleased to say.
I've auto stacked by time to highlight where AutoETTR had several attempts at finding ETTR.
I then black flag the images accordingly eg in a 3 stack, I flag the first 2 manually.
I then start processing the remaining images.

This seems to work but doesn't seem a very elegant way of doing things (lots of manual input).
I've had an attempt at a .vsb file as shown in a forum posting but had no success ("files failed to convert.  See log").

Does anyone using AutoETTR, DualISO & LR have a neater workflow solution please?

[muggo]

I've taken a few shots in full manual mode as advised.
DualISO settings can be 100/100, 200/200, 6400/1600 or other automatically selected variations, depending on the light.
Does this sound about right?  6400/1600?  I guess this is the same as 1600/6400 isn't it?

I've had a play around with Expo Lock too but can't figure out what, if anything, it's affecting.
I'd like to have the AV fixed (by me), have TV down to the slowest I allow in the ML settings & have (Dual)ISO decided by ML to give a good exposure.
Is this a setting in Expo Lock?  Is it AV>TV,ISO I need to use?

Thanks in advance for your help.

[Audionut]

I've found that once the novelty wears off you tend to apply some respect for the shutter life again.

I use the lightroom plugin for converting the dual iso files, then use a lightroom preset to set the settings that apply to all files.

Dual iso works both ways in that it can save the shadows or save the highlights.  So when saving the shadows it will be something like 100/1600, and when saving the highlights it will be something like 1600/100.  If you're exposed for the highlights it will save the shadows and vice-versa.

The highest ISO dual iso will use is set via the Canon menu.  "Auto ISO range".

The best way to find out what something does in ML is to find the feature on the features page, then follow the link.  Expo lock goes here:  http://www.magiclantern.fm/forum/index.php?topic=3820.msg20554#msg20554
Also look at the links in my sig.

In manual mode you can have a fixed aperture, then use the slowest shutter option in AutoETTR.  For dual iso you'll need to play with the midtone and shadow SNR settings in AutoETTR.  Higher values for these options means try and make them have higher quality.

dual ISO is not a free lunch, it has some drawbacks.  Look at price to pay.

[muggo]

Thanks for the feedback Audionut.

I've followed your recommendations by importing untreated CR2 files & exporting to cr2hdr with the LR plugin.
When I say they are untreated, my usual import routine makes a copy to an external disk & adds the date into the filename, but apart from that, they are as per the SD card.  No lens profile, CA or anything.  I've copied test images from this backup. 
The processed images are renamed with DualISO in the filename, but still have no data attached (EXIFdata?) Lens type, AV, TV ISO etc.  Portrait format shots appear in landscape format.
They were taken in AV mode if that makes a difference but I'll use Manual in future.

Where am I going wrong?  I need the data to appear with the image.

[chris_overseas]

Where am I going wrong?  I need the data to appear with the image.

I'm guessing you installed the stable version of the plugin? Try using the beta version of the LR plugin, it works well and has a lot of improvements over the stable version. The stable version is quite a bit older and likely has an old version of cr2hdr that doesn't transfer the EXIF across for you. Alternatively, you can just replace the version of the cr2hdr executable that is bundled with a newer version.

[muggo]

That might well be the issue Chris.  So:
I disabled the old cr2hdr plugin & loaded the new beta version.  Processed but no EXIF.
I removed the old plugin, restarted & installed the new one.  No EXIF.
I then renamed cr2hdr20bit.exe as cr2hdr.exe & it converted OK & with new export interface, but no EXIF.

THEN
Instead of converting to DNG in the import process (I always do this), I just Added them thus keeping them as CR2 after import.
Conversion worked OK WITH EXIF!!!

Thanks very much for your help.

[Walter Schulz]

Latest plug-in does contain cr2hdr.exe which is in fact 20-bit version renamed. If your download contains two cr2hdr*.exe files you got an outdated version. Make sure to use latest beta containing cr2hdr.exe, dcraw.exe and exiftool.exe.
https://bitbucket.org/kichetof/lr_cr2hdr/downloads/cr2hdr.3.0BETA3.3.lrplugin.zip
Replace cr2hdr.exe with file linked in a1ex's post.

[muggo]

Thanks Walter.
Yes, I was on an old download so I've installed BETA 3.3 from your link & it still works WITH EXIF.

Thanks again.