Live view is the camera showing you, on its rear screen or in an electronic viewfinder, the picture its sensor is seeing right now. Because the view comes from the same sensor that will record the photo, it can show you the exposure, the color and the exact focus before you press the shutter, which no optical viewfinder can do.
That makes it one of the best learning aids a camera has: change a setting and watch the picture change. It also makes it easy to trust too much. The live view is a processed preview, refreshed many times a second, and there are specific situations where it shows you something quite different from the file you will get. This page explains where the picture comes from, what it gets right, where it stops telling the truth, and how to use it to focus precisely.
Where the live view picture comes from
A DSLR has a mirror behind the lens set at 45 degrees. Through the viewfinder you are looking at light bounced off that mirror up into a prism and out to your eye. The shutter in front of the sensor stays closed, so the sensor sees nothing until you take the picture. Switch a DSLR to live view and the mirror flips up and the shutter opens, so light reaches the sensor, and the sensor’s output is shown on the rear screen. The optical viewfinder goes dark.
A mirrorless camera has no mirror and no optical viewfinder, so it is always in that second state. Its electronic viewfinder and its rear screen are two displays fed by the same sensor. Live view is not a mode on a mirrorless camera; it is how the camera works. A phone camera is the same: the screen you frame on is a live view.
Wondering which kind of camera suits the way you shoot? DSLR vs mirrorless vs point-and-shoot cameras sets out what the mirror, or its absence, means in practice.
What live view gets right
Because the preview is built from the sensor, it can show things that an optical viewfinder only shows after the fact, on playback.
- Brightness, with exposure simulation on. Turn the shutter speed from 1/250 to 1/30 and the view gets three stops brighter, because the camera brightens the preview by the same amount. Dial in exposure compensation and you see it at once. This is why manual mode feels so much less like guesswork on a mirrorless camera.
- Color. The preview uses the white balance and picture style you have set, so a tungsten setting in daylight turns the screen blue before you shoot.
- Framing. The view is the sensor’s own frame, so what is at the edge of the screen is at the edge of the picture. Many optical viewfinders show a little less than the full frame.
- Focus. Whatever is sharp on the sensor is sharp in the view, and you can magnify it to check, which is the subject of the focusing section below.
- Overlays that need the sensor. A live histogram, highlight warnings or zebras, focus peaking and an electronic level all work from the sensor stream.
The display side of this, the buttons that cycle the overlays, screen brightness and the eye sensor, is covered in viewfinder and screen basics. This page is about the picture itself and when to believe it.
Where the preview stops telling the truth
The live view is a video stream, refreshed something like 30 to 120 times a second. A single preview frame can never take longer than that, so anything the real exposure does that a short video frame cannot, the preview has to fake or skip. These are the cases that catch people.
Flash
The preview shows only the light that is already there. A studio set at 1/125, f/8, ISO 100 for strobes looks black on the screen with exposure simulation on, because without the flash it would be black. With a speedlight outdoors the preview shows the ambient exposure, not the flash-lit subject. For any flash photography, turn exposure simulation off so the screen shows a bright view to compose with, then judge the exposure from a test shot.
Long exposures and motion
Set a shutter speed of a few seconds and the preview cannot show you a few seconds of anything. It brightens the view with gain up to a limit, then stops tracking, and some cameras switch simulation off for bulb and very long exposures. It never shows motion: water that will turn to silk, car lights that will streak, an aurora that will soften as it moves. In the dark, that boosted preview is also noisier and coarser than the file. Judge long exposures and night frames from a test shot and its histogram, not the live view.
Shooting after dark and wondering how to get exposure and focus right when the screen cannot help? Night photography covers test shots, settings and the habits that work when the preview runs out.
The histogram is of the JPEG, not the raw file
If you shoot raw, the live view, its histogram and its highlight warnings are all built from the camera’s processed version of the picture, the same processing that would make a JPEG. Your white balance, picture style and contrast setting change what you see and change the histogram, while the raw file underneath is untouched by them. A high-contrast picture style can make the histogram show clipped highlights that the raw file still holds. Most cameras build the preview a little cautiously, so a slight warning is often recoverable from raw; a big block of blinking white usually is not.
Not sure whether that difference matters for the way you shoot? Raw vs JPEG explains what each file keeps and what the camera’s processing throws away.
Depth of field
Many cameras keep the lens near its widest aperture while you compose, so the view stays bright and autofocus has light to work with, and only close down to your chosen aperture at the moment of exposure. The preview then shows shallower depth of field than the photo will have. Other cameras show the working aperture, sometimes only up to about f/8, or only when you press a depth of field preview button or turn on a depth of field simulation setting. If the background looks softer on screen than in the picture, this is why. Check your camera’s setting before trusting the blur you see.
Brightness of the screen itself
Exposure simulation shows the relative brightness of the picture, but the screen still looks dazzling at night and dim in sunshine, because your eyes adapt to the world around it. Read the histogram, not the glow of the screen. If your photos keep coming out darker than they looked on the back of the camera, why are my photos too dark works through the causes.
Exposure simulation: when to turn it off
Cameras name this setting differently (exposure simulation, display simulation, setting effect or something similar, usually in the shooting or display menu), but they all do the same thing: with it on, the view shows the exposure your settings will make; with it off, the camera brightens or darkens the view to whatever is easiest to see, whatever your settings.
- Daylight, ambient light only: Exposure simulation: On. Why: The view previews the exposure you will get.
- Learning manual exposure: Exposure simulation: On. Why: You see each stop of change as you make it.
- Studio strobes or flash as the main light: Exposure simulation: Off. Why: The preview cannot show the flash, so with it on the screen is near black.
- Composing in the dark: Exposure simulation: Off. Why: A boosted view lets you see to frame and focus.
- Exposures of several seconds or bulb: Exposure simulation: Either; judge from a test shot. Why: The preview cannot simulate that much light or any motion.
Focusing in live view
Live view focuses on the image sensor itself. A DSLR using its viewfinder focuses with a separate autofocus module under the mirror, which only approximates where the sensor is; if the lens and body are slightly out of step, the photo is front or back focused. In live view there is no separate module to disagree with, so focus lands where the sensor sees sharpness. On older DSLRs, live view autofocus was slower because it used contrast detection; cameras with phase detection built into the sensor focus quickly in live view. How autofocus works explains both methods.
Live view also lets you put the focus point almost anywhere in the frame, rather than only where a viewfinder module has its points, and on many cameras you choose it by tapping the screen.
Magnify to confirm
The most precise focusing tool on any camera is live view magnification: zoom the preview, commonly to about 5x and 10x, on the spot that must be sharp, and focus until the finest detail there is crisp. At normal screen size a three inch display cannot show whether focus is a few millimeters off. At 10x it can. This is how careful landscape, product and macro work is focused on a tripod, and it is how stars are focused at night: magnify a bright star and turn the focus ring until it is the smallest point you can get. How to photograph stars walks through that method.
Focus peaking, which outlines the sharpest edges in color, is the other live view focus aid. Peaking finds the plane of focus fast; magnification confirms it. Manual focus covers when to use each.
Practice it here: switch the simulated camera to manual focus, turn on peaking and get the subject sharp at f/2 or wider, where there is very little room for error.
Working close up, where the zone of sharpness is a few millimeters deep? Macro photography covers focusing, depth and light at close range.
Live view on a DSLR: when it is worth it
On a DSLR, live view is a choice, and it has a clear place.
- On a tripod. Precise magnified focus, a composition you can see without crouching to the eyepiece, and a mirror that is already up. Mirror slap, the vibration of the mirror flipping up as you shoot, blurs pictures most at shutter speeds from roughly 1/2 to 1/60 second; in live view it is gone. Some shake can still come from the shutter itself, which an electronic first curtain removes. Camera shake covers both, and mechanical vs electronic shutter explains the shutter options.
- Low and high angles. With a tilting screen you can frame from ground level or above a crowd without putting your eye to the camera.
- Video. Recording needs the sensor running continuously, so video is always live view.
For fast action, the viewfinder usually wins on a DSLR. Its autofocus module is built for tracking, bursts are often faster through the viewfinder, there is no display delay, and a camera braced against your face is steadier than one held out at arm’s length.
The costs: battery, heat, lag and the sun
- Battery. A running sensor, processor and display use far more power than an optical viewfinder, so a DSLR gets noticeably fewer shots per charge in live view, and a mirrorless camera fewer than a DSLR through its finder. Carry a spare.
- Heat. Hours of continuous live view, as in long video takes or a night of time lapse, warm the sensor. A warmer sensor adds noise, and some cameras stop recording to protect themselves.
- Lag. The picture on the screen is a fraction of a second behind the world, which matters with fast, unpredictable subjects. EVF lag explains where the delay comes from and how to work around it.
- The sun. In live view the shutter is open and the lens focuses the sun straight onto the sensor and the shutter blades. Pointing a long lens at the sun in live view for any length of time can damage them, as camera makers warn. Do not leave the camera aimed at the sun, and photograph the sun itself only through a proper solar filter.
Live view beyond the camera: tethering and phones
Connect a camera to a computer or tablet and the same live view can be shown on a much bigger screen. In a studio that lets the photographer, a client or an art director see framing, light and focus together before the shot. Tethering covers the setup. A phone’s screen is a live view too, with one difference worth knowing: phones often combine several frames when you take the picture, especially in night modes, so the saved photo can be brighter and cleaner than the preview suggested.
Common mistakes with live view
- Judging exposure by how bright the screen looks. Use the histogram and highlight warnings.
- Leaving exposure simulation on with studio flash. The screen goes black and you cannot compose. Turn it off for flash.
- Trusting the preview for a long exposure. It cannot show seconds of light or any motion. Take a test shot.
- Reading a clipped histogram as a ruined raw file. The histogram is of the processed picture. A sliver of warning often holds detail in raw.
- Judging background blur from a wide-open preview. Check whether your camera previews the working aperture.
- Focusing at screen size. Magnify when the focus point must be exact.
- Handholding at arm’s length with a slow shutter. The camera is less steady away from your face. Brace it or raise the shutter speed.
- Leaving live view pointed at the sun. The sensor and shutter are exposed.
Try this: test your preview against the file (10 minutes)
- Minutes 1 to 3. Put the camera in manual, exposure simulation on, live histogram on. Set ISO 100 and f/8 and pick a shutter speed that puts the histogram in the middle. Now change the shutter speed by three stops each way (for example 1/250, 1/125, 1/60, 1/30 and back up to 1/2000) and watch the view and the histogram move a stop at a time. Take a frame at each end.
- Minutes 4 to 5. Set white balance to tungsten in daylight, watch the view turn blue, take a frame, then set it back. If you shoot raw, note that the histogram changed shape when only the white balance changed.
- Minutes 6 to 8. Put a page of small print a few meters away. Focus normally, then magnify to 10x on the text and refocus by hand until the letters are crispest. Take a frame each way and compare them on a computer at 100 percent.
- Minutes 9 to 10. Set your widest aperture, ideally f/1.8 to f/4, then f/11, and look at the background on screen at each. Take a frame at each. Does the screen show the change before you shoot, or only in the photo?
How to judge it: the exposure ends should look as the preview promised; if they do not, your simulation is off or the screen brightness is misleading you. The magnified focus frame should be visibly sharper on the computer. If the f/11 background looked the same as the wide one on screen, your camera previews wide open, and you now know to use its depth of field preview.
Live view questions
Is live view bad for the sensor?
No, in normal use. The sensor is built to run continuously, as it does on every mirrorless camera and for video. The two real risks are heat over very long sessions, which adds noise, and the focused sun, which can damage the sensor and shutter.
Why is my live view black when I shoot with studio lights?
Exposure simulation is showing what your settings would record without the flash, which is almost nothing. Turn exposure simulation off, or switch the camera’s display to a setting that ignores exposure, and the view will be bright enough to compose.
Why does the photo look different from the live view?
Usually one of four reasons: exposure simulation is off, the shot used flash, the exposure was longer than the preview can simulate, or the lens closed down to a smaller aperture than the preview showed. Screen brightness compared with your surroundings also makes the same picture look brighter or darker.
Is the live view histogram accurate for raw files?
It is accurate for the processed version of the picture, which is close to the JPEG. A raw file usually holds a little more highlight detail than the histogram suggests, and your white balance and picture style change the histogram without changing the raw data.
Should I use live view or the viewfinder?
On a mirrorless camera both are live view, so pick the eye-level finder for steadiness and bright sun and the screen for odd angles. On a DSLR, use live view on a tripod and for precise focus, and the optical viewfinder for moving subjects.
Want to see how changing one setting ripples through the others while you watch the screen? ISO and aperture each show what that setting does to light, noise and depth.