Quote: If you like to use the auto focus on the dslr, then, you need to focus on the subject, then, using spot metering, press the ae-l button while the camera is focussed on the subject. .. this will record and hold the reading for about 30 seconds (this time can be customised if you scour the menu system). While the reading is being held for this 30 seconds or so, you have time to refocus ( just to make sure it's right!) and, holding the shutter half way down to keep the focus locked, do your reframing to put the prefocussed subject on the edge of the frame at the edge of the dark tunnel. That way the subject will be in focus and correctly exposed.
There are other ways of getting the focus and exposure onto the same day in tricky situations, using ev compensation and other arcane things, if you really like to take 64 steps to cover a yard. By then, your subject will have walked off. Or flown away. Or died of boredom.
That's why M mode - despite people's initial reservations - turns out to be much *easier* than the auto modes in msot respects. Hit green button and exposure is done. Then focus however the heck you want - MF or AF. It's not complicated *at all* and takes a fraction of a second. And much of the time, you can hit green button then let the exposure ride for quite a while (till the light changes).
Quote: It's just another example of all this automation making life far more complicated than it needs to be! (Maybe I should buy a Leica M6... manual everything!)
You don't need a manual camera to take advantage of manual modes - just move your dial to M...