[Tiberius]

Nicole seems to have covered things quite well, but I'd like to add my own, if that's okay.

Originally Posted by winterminute

1) Does the camera do any metering when shooting in manual mode?

The camera will meter in the sense that it will give you a guide as to whether the camera thinks the image will be under or over exposed. However, it will not adjust any settings. I use a 350D (Digital Rebel XT), and it has a "match needle" display in the LCD screen and viewfinder. Basically, it looks like this:

-2..1..V..1..+2

It has a little pointer underneath which is underneath the V when the camera thinks it is properly exposed.

However, in manual mode the camera doesn't adjust any settings at all, it's completely up to you. Metering in manual mode is only to give you a guide to the proper exposure.

2) What's the best type of metering?

Depends on what you are shooting.

My camera has three kinds of metering: Evaluative, partial and center-weighted.

Evaluative metering considers the brightness of the entire image in order to get an exposure that gets as much of the picture properly exposed as possible.

Partial metering covers only the center of the viewfinder. You can use this to determine the exact exposure needed for the subject (such as a person's face), but the exposure may be off for other parts of the picture.

Center-weighted is kinda like a cross between the two. It looks at the entire picture, but it places more emphasis on the center of the image.

3) I've read that you should set your exposure -1 or +1 (I can't remember which) if you're shooting digital, any truth to this?

You should aim for the proper exposure, not slightly over or under exposed. But there's really no such thing as the "correct" exposure. The camera may say there is, but that's based on the camera assuming that 18% of the light falling on the scene is being reflected back. Certain conditions (like a beach or snow) don't behave like this, and the camera is fooled and gives a wrong exposure. So feel free to use the camera's metering as a guide, but ultimately the "right" exposure is what you think is best. it can be very different to what someone else thinks is the correct exposure, because photography is art, not science.

4) What is EV? Is it a universal number or a relative number based on how far away you are from a correctly exposed shot? Or is this a value your camera produces that changes from camera to camera?

EV stands for Exposure Value. The Wiki article explains it much better than I could.

5) When they talk about correctly exposed shots, do they mean an EV of 0?

As I said before, there's really no such thing as "correct exposure", but only what is the exposure that you feel is best for a particular shot.

6) HDRs confuse me When they' talking about taking multiple shots for HDRs, they talk about taking it -1/0/+1. From what I'm reading there are only 3 factors in exposure (duh, the exposure triangle), but I don't understand how I can change any of them without changing the "feel" of shot which would create problems when I merge them into a single HDR.
-- Longer exposure would create streaks
-- Larger DOF would change what was in focus vs out of focus

I'm not really up on HDR. I'd go with what Nicole said.

7) What's a DOF calculator? When would I use one? Is this a mathematical equation I use on site or something that a camera tells you.

Depth of Field is simply how far in front and behind the point of focus things can be while still being acceptably sharp. For example, if you take a picture of someone, you'd focus on their eyes. However, this wouldn't mean that the tip of their nose is out of focus. The point of focus is the subject's eyes, but something just in front or just behind (like the nose and ears) could still be in focus. The depth of field is changed by the aperture. A narrow aperture (high f number) has a deeper depth of field - something can be further behind or in front before becoming blurry. A wider aperture (low f number) has a shallower depth of field, so things become blurry faster as they move away from the point of focus.

As for depth of field calculators, I'd ignore them. They work, sure enough, but it's rather clumsy to sit down in the middle of a shoot and use them. It's much easier to either use the Depth of field preview button which lets you see the effect through the viewfinder, or simply take the photo and check it on the LCD display. make sure you zoom in though!

I'm at the stage where I want to learn the underlining theory and logic behind some of these settings and techniques, so feel free to hit me with the nitty gritty.

Thanks!

Have a look at the tutorials in my signature, hopefully they'll be able to help you out.