At first I didn’t see any point to Live View, but after using the camera for a while, I’ve found distinct uses for it. My favorite way to use Live View (where you see the image using the Monitor LCD instead of the normal viewfinder) is while shooting macro images.

I was shooting a pipevine swallowtail (Battus philenor) butterfly on a tree in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. I had the camera on a tripod, using an older AI-Nikkor 200 mm f/4 manual-focus lens on a bellows, to shoot larger than life-sized macro images. I was using my normal viewfinder when I suddenly realized that this would be a lot easier if I could stand back a little bit. I turned on Live View mode and was amazed at how easy macro shots were when I was not hovering over the camera so closely. Figure 1-7 shows the result of that shoot taken while using Live View mode.

Figure 1-7. Pipevine swallowtail (Battus philenor) butterfly in macro

For this type of shot, I was able to focus in Live View very accurately, and I think I’ll find other ways to use it.