[photog]

How do all of you K20D users get the most use out of the limited functuality of the live view?
Ron McDermott
Queensland Australia

[Arpe]

I used it recently to photo a parade- held it over my head as I was about 4 or 5 rows of people back, set the lens at 17mm, about f4, high ISO as it was night, pressed the AF button while looking at the screen to get about the right focus distance, then take photos holding it up high! Useful in that situation. Would've done the same thing without live view, but just pointing and hoping, at least i could frame with the screen.

[Ishpuini]

I've used it a few times on tripod for still life subjects. Live view enabled me not to have to look through the viewfinder to assess changes I made to the scene I was photographing.

Next to that I did use it on occasion to shoot from odd angles. Though at static subjects always as the lag between pressing the shutter release and the actual exposure is too long for non static subject matter. For instance I did a series of house front details where I wanted parallel vertical lines so it was important I could keep the camera back parallel to the house front, something liveview enabled me to assess when I needed to raise or lower the camera.

For non static I usually just raise the camera above my head and guestimate the direction to point the camera in. I don't use liveview in that case.

Wim

[Cosmo]

I don't like live view, when using compacts, I always want to put my face to the camera.

[tenpointnine]

I've never used it

[pasipasi]

Only occasionally to see the narrow dof, but I would imagine it could be useful for some tripod macro work.

[Maffer]

Tripod macros and tripod portraits with Nokton 58mm. What appears to be pinsharp in viewfinder isn't in the final image. I cannot trust what I see without the live view. Messing with shims and all that isn't for me. I don't want to tweak my camera like I gotta tweak PC hardware for work every day.

[Edvinas]

I don't use it...

[Mike Cash]

I use it for focusing/composing long-exposure shots as it makes it easy to do even with ND filters and/or polarizers attached. And it is nice to be able to zoom in on a specific point and do precise focusing under those circumstances as well.

[NaClH2O]

I haven't used it in the past but after reading the posts from some of the others it looks like it might be helpful in some instances.

NaCl(absolute wealth of knowledge here at PF)H2O

[imtheguy]

Precise manual focusing with 800mm reflex lens for live but still outdoor subjects. This is also where I miss a higher rez screen (think K7) when zooming live view to max. It works but is not pretty.

[VaughnA]

I have a K10 so I don't have live view but it is at the very BOTTOM of my list of required features on my future cameras. Even with my old P&S I bet I took maybe 1 out of 1000 pictures with live view. It just doesn't let me see much of anything, especially in sunlight. IMHO the least useful feature on a DSLR. Leave off live view and take a few bucks off of the price.

[Parallax]

I've played with it, but never actually used it.

[bdery]

I use Live view for:

1-overhead shooting. Pretty useful.

2-Macro photo with my 28 mm and reversing ring. Invaluable, anything using a reversing ring and saying live view is not useful is missing something.

3-macro photo in general, though that might change once I get my dedicated macro lens.

4-tripod work in general.

5-with most of my MF lenses, when I want to focus properly.

The only thing I miss is contrast focusing, I hear it works on the K7, but it's ont available on my K20D. I use the VF for most things, but there are times when live view is almost necessary.

[Smirf]

The slow autofocus in live view is a turn off for me, so I don't use it much. Last time I used it was when I had connected the camera to the TV to entertain my sister's children. They had a blast watching them selves live on TV