bri1

<p>I shoot a lot of interiors also, but mostly for rentals where what's outside isn't really important so I usually blow out the windows and expose so the interior is bright. When I do shoot a nice place where I need to show the outside, I've found that the best way for me is to combine exposures with masks is PS. I've tried many HDR programs and never really like the results. Since windows usually have straight lines, it's not that hard or time consuming to make a selection of them with the polygonal lasso tool. I don't think any camera has enough dynamic range to get what you're after. You will always have to combine exposures.</p>

<p>Ed, one advantage to having a 6D 7DII combo over using the 5Ds in 1.6x mode is that the 7DII shoots 10fps where the 5Ds is 5fps. A huge advantage for sports, birds and such. Not sure how good the AF is on the 5Ds, but I'll bet the 7DII is faster.</p>

<p>Have you tried switching lenses on the same tripod with the same setup?. Process of elimination.</p>

<p>So looking at your shots and settings, I would recommend a few things. First, all of the hummingbird shots in the tree are under exposed. You are correct in that your meter is exposing for the bright background, and therefore underexposing the subject. With experience, you will come to recognize this condition. What you need to do to correct it is overexpose depending on just how bright the background is. I can tell from your setting that you're not quite understanding this. The first shot you have close to a good exposure, but you have a -0.3 value when it should be at least a +0.3 or more. You did the opposite of what you should have. Then as you increased shutter speed, thereby increasing the under exposure, you didn't change any settings. When you went from 1/160th to 1/400th, you lost just over 1 stop of light because you more than doubled the shutter speed. So you would have to at least double your ISO to 1600. Or open up the lens by another stop. But your lens was already open all the way so you have to double the ISO. If that doesn't make sense, you need to google "exposure triangle". You really need to understand the relationship between shutter aperture and ISO. The last shot of the eaglet is the same deal. It's way under exposed. That one needs at least another stop of brightness. Again, if you're shooting up into the sky, and the sun is above, you're going to need to over expose by close to a stop. Since you're shooting manual, you just need to either lower the shutter speed, or more likely, up the ISO by a lot so you can keep a decent shutter. This assumes your lens is already at it's widest aperture.<br> Now that eagle in the sky with the side light from the sun is a different story. When the sun is at the side like that, lighting up the underside of the bird, you don't need as much or any exposure compensation. Maybe just a little. That's a pretty well exposed shot, just a little dark on the shadow wing. You could probably bring out a little of that in post. It's a little fuzzy, and I'm betting that's mostly because you are shooting wide open. You need to find the sweet spot for your lens aperture for sharpness. If you want the best results, you need to stop down a bit from wide open. At least f/6.3. With this lens, probably f/8 is going to give you the best result. Unfortunately, that means you're going to have to use high ISO. But in general, noise is better than blur.<br> The well lit hummers that are still a bit fuzzy is also likely from shooting wide open. Again, if you stop down the lens a bit, like to at least 6.3 I can almost guarantee you will get sharper images. That will mean raising ISO. A way you can cut the noise back a bit is to "expose to the right" which means overexpose ALL of your shots a bit when shooting with higher ISO. Noise is less in brightness than in underexposed. Google "expose to the right".<br> Everyone has their own way of doing things, and I'm not saying mine is better than anyone else's, but I shoot birds in aperture priority. I have a pretty good lens, the canon 100-400L, and it's pretty good wide open, but I prefer to stop it down to 6.3 and leave it there. Then I adjust the ISO to get the shutter speed I want. And I use exposure compensation when needed, like the hummer in the tree. </p>