It isn't easy for the AE to know what the photographer decides to be important in a scene. Take this for instance:

http://bjoernen.ebolaget.com/BlownOut.jpg

What is most important, to get details on the ship, or to get a decent overall lightness of the shot? Nobody but the photographer can make the call. Some will sacrifice the ship, some think it looks horrible and will underexpose.

I can learn to use AE, but only if I can predict well enough what it will do with different shots, and perhaps "guide" it some. I'm not at that level yet.

EDIT:
What would have been useful is an exposure compensation dial readily available. The backlight/spotlight buttons are pretty useless for fine tuning, and dedicating the menu wheel to changing shutter speed is waste of a good tool to me. I hardly ever change shutter speed. The menu wheel could have controlled AE compensation, so the AE could have been a bit more useful.

When you project HD to 6-20 feet you simply can't have any blown-highlights other than, perhaps, tiny reflections. IF you believe this, then YOU have no choice -- you can't sacrifice anything -- unless as an FX. Then I agree you must take control. Although, I would use the AE bias adjustment to crank in the correct amount of bias.

Likewise, one can bias the AWB to get a look, but still use AWB for each shot.

Likewise you can point the camer at each object, let the AE do its job, note the distance number -- no need for a tape measure.

THe key is to always lock anything automatic if there is a chance something wil disturb the view,

I must disagree with this "let camera decide" approach. Normally shots include person's face or faces, you have to be consistent in face exposure; face exposure must consistent from shot to shot. You expose face correctly, make sure everything else is within lattitude of camera, or if everything else is OK, change person's face lighting to expose it right.

Normally one uses incident light meter for face exposure, but could also use spot meter. The camera does not even have spot meter as far I know, only some programmed averaging exposure.

Radek

I only plan to shoot a feature length story and like the CineTone look. To me, it does look a lot more like film. Are you saying I shouldn't use it?