I recently purchased a Nikon D70 to replace my Coolpix 995, and I'm still trying to figure it out.

Am I missing something in the manual, or does setting the AE Lock seem to be very difficult (select the proper metering method, hold down the AEL button, depress the shutter halfway, etc)? On the 995 I just set a setting, and the camera used the exposure settings of the next photograph until I turned off the setting or reset it.

Any hints from D70 users would be appreciated.

Tom

Tom,
Yes the Nikon DSLRs don't have the Coolpix menu option to keep AE lock on. You just hold the AE lock button on with your thumb whilst shooting. Makes resetting simpler and avoids forgetting to turn off AE lock but I agree, you miss it sometimes. I use the manual setting (I have to with the Peleng 8mm) which avoids AE lock.

Simon

Just to be clear, you don't have to hold the AE lock button whilst you take a shot. You just point the camera at what you want to meter off and press the AE lock button (press and let go). This sets AE lock to on (you will see "EL" appear in on the bottom left hand side of the viewfinder display). The AE Lock will remain active for all subsequent shots until you switch AE lock off.

My D70 menu settings if you are interested are as follows:

menu item 15 "AE-L/AF-L" set to AE Lock hold

menu item 16 "AE-L button" set to OK (this means a half press of the sutter will NOT activate AE lock.

Then i think I'm right in saying that you can adjust the length of time the AE-Lock remains on by setting menu item 23 "Meter-off" to something like 16s or 30min. If you do set this to a long time period though don;t forget to manually turn AE lock off when you have finished shooting your subject by pressing the AE Lock button again.

Hope this helps.

Glenn

Thanks Glenn, I must admit I hadn't spotted these menu options, it obviously helps to unpack the manuals.

Simon