I am fairly new to the world of SLR cameras. I have joined a class to learn how to use a SLR camera. With the "old" manual cameras you prssed the button and it had a built in light meter that suggested the correct f stop and speed.

Reading the manual, when the EOS 300 is in "M" mode there is a way of metering but it relies on + / -, up a bit down a bit. This all seems a bit hit and miss to me. Am I understanding the manual correctly?

Can somebody explain in easy steps how to use the light meter on a Canon EOS 300 / Rebel 2000 camera in "M" mode?

-- bill quinn (bill.quinn@btinternet.com), September 18, 2001

Answers

Forgive me if I seem cynical...

I have been involved in these SLR class type things before. The people that ran the one I was involved in were what we in the mountain biking world call "retrogrouches". This means that they will continue to use the ancient, beaten up old gear, and insist that it performs better than modern gear, especially when it breaks, or simply doesn't work as well.

Anyway, yes, unfortunately it sounds like the EOS 300 has a rather hit and miss system. It is like the system that the A2(e) had (the US version of the EOS 5), which prompted many US buyers to get the EOS 5 imported instead, because that has a better (but not brilliant) "needle" scale.

Why bother with Manual mode at all though? In many situations program (using the shift function) is as capable, or Av or Tv mode. Using exposure compensation also then means you have complete control (in fact moreso, because you then know how much you're under or over exposing, rather than the up a bit, down a bit of manual.

-- Isaac Sibson (Isibson@hotmail.com), September 19, 2001.

It sounds like the EOS 300 uses the same basic metered manual system as the older EOS 1000N. (only the EOS 300 has many more zones in evaluative metering mode than the older camera)

http://www.grocible.com/photo/rebel-s-ii.html

-- NK Guy (tela@tela.bc.ca), October 02, 2001.