Photographers?

[RussBraaten]

I love my digital camera but I can't for the life of me figure out the manual controls. I have a middle of the line camera that looks like an DSLR but it isn't an SLR. I wonder how many other wanna be or real photographers would like to get together and learn how to use our cameras a little better. I am not talking about any grand idea of a photography club but maybe an afternoon of people having lunch and then taking photos of the buffet line. hehehehe

Any thoughts?

[dirtrider73068]

I have wondered that very same thing, I have had mine for over 2 years and use the auto feature more unless the thing I am pictureing is moving I know what setting to put it on. Other than stuff like apurture ad stuff like that, if its not set right the picture is real bright in one spot or blurry and clear, its wierd when you get to playing with manual controls, I even read the manul book a few times trying understand it.

[RussBraaten]

Well there is now two of us. Now we need to find a friendly person who knows how to adjust those goofy controls.

I have read the manual a few times and the picture changes but not for the better.

[TomGirl]

I have a digital camera that I rarely use for that very reason, I'm clueless on most of it.

[bandnerd]

I have a DSLR and am completely in love with it. I almost NEVER use the auto function. I like control, which is why I got what I got.

I have a Canon Rebel XTi, and recently got a free photo lesson from a working photographer who is a parent of a student at my school.

Really, learning how to use your camera isn't all *that* hard. Read the manual cover to cover, research online how to take good photos in different settings, and/or consult the company of your camera (canon, fuji, whatever) if the need arises.

By far the hardest thing to do is take action shots. I have learned this somewhat well, as it is a skill, and not something that just happens.

As for aperture and shutter speeds...well...it depends on what you need. Most of the time, a shutter speed of 1/60 and an aperture of f4.0 will do the trick. The 1/60 just means 1/60th of a second. A faster shutter speed will capture movement better (you can go all the way to 1/200 I think) but because the shutter moves faster, it lets in less light...which is why you open up the aperture to f4.0 or higher. Just mess around with it until you find the right settings. You can also adjust the flash exposure, which is why possibly, dirtrider, you're getting a too-bright flash. You also have to put some distance between you and the subject, or you will get a washed-out subject.

Okay, that's all the time I have for teaching now, kiddos. You can always pm me if you have photography questions. I have learned a lot through reading and practicing what I have read. I am not a professional by any means, but I know my camera well. If you're going to spend $100's of dollars on something, then you really should take the time to get to know it.

[Bobby H]

Russ, which model of D-SLR camera do you have? Not all have the same kinds of controls for manually adjusting aperture, exposure time, auto-focus controls, etc. Even the models within a certain brand's series (such as Canon's EOS series bodies) will be different from one model to the next. A Canon Digital Rebel is quite a bit different from an EOS-5D or EOS 1Ds Mark II.

If you're just starting out, I would recommend reading through the camera's user manual and also visiting some photography enthusiast websites, such as Digital Photography Review. They have a number of forums dedicated to specific camera models and lens systems.

If you're serious about photography, I would recommend getting a good general purpose zoom lens and an external flash. Most on board camera flashes stink because their flashes don't have good reach or any flexibility. An external flash can vary its intensity and you can angle the flash to "bounce" it and yield more natural looking lighting effects. Also get a decent tripod.

As for aperture and shutter speeds...well...it depends on what you need. Most of the time, a shutter speed of 1/60 and an aperture of f4.0 will do the trick.

That greatly depends on the lens being used, particularly its focal length, and the shooting conditions. There's no single manual setting that will work for all purposes.

I vary the aperture greatly depending on how much depth of field I want in the image. For some kinds of portrait photography, wildlife photography and some still life images I may want the background blurred out of focus as much as possible to isolate the subject in the image. So I'll open up the aperture as big as possible to narrow the depth of field only to the object I'm shooting. This can be very effective with a good quality telephoto zoom lens, such as Canon's EF 70-200mm f/2.8L lens. Some fixed focal length prime lenses can have even larger apertures for more dreamy looking low DOF effects, not to mention much faster frame rate capability.

The more expensive lenses are going to give a photographer more creative freedom and work in more demanding shooting situations, such as lower light indoor sporting events. Even with good lenses, in some of those cases you're still going to have to do things like boosting the sensitivity of the cameras image sensor chip (ISO speed).

Overall, photography is very much a balancing act.

[bandnerd]

Yeah, I know the 1/60 and f4.0 won't work for everything, but for general shooting with my kit 18-55mm lens, it has served me pretty well.

And yeah, for most cameras, the on-camera flash really isn't great. I think 14ft is about as far as they go most of the time. I bought a larger 60-ft flash from Epperson's and got ripped off. It's a piece, let me tell you. I plan on getting a Canon Speedlite flash soon. And a new lens, as soon as I can afford it...all that stuff gets expensive fast.

I am also curious what kind of camera Russ has. I have a school camera where I work that looks like a mini DSLR...it's a fuji finepix. Not my favorite camera, but the kids do okay with it. I'm wondering if his is like that. It's really just a fancy-looking point and shoot.

[Bobby H]

General purpose point and shoot digital cameras work well for most people. Canon's PowerShot models are pretty good and have a handy viewfinder that can flip out for taking well framed self portraits to stick on your MySpace page.

OTOH, the D-SLR thing is for those who want finer results. But, yes, collecting the extra equipment gets expensive very quick. I spent $2300 on two lenses for my camera just recently and will probably spend at least another couple grand for additional lenses over the next year or two.

[bandnerd]

Dang. I saw a macro lens (macro photography is by far my favorite) for about $800 from Canon. 'Bout had a heart attack.

I love my canon powershot SD300 elph, though. I've had it about two years and have taken a lot of great photos with it. It was the first camera I ever bought and owned all by myself. I know they make fancier models now with higher MP's but I get such great results with it (4MP) that I just don't see the need to upgrade it yet. Not while I have the Rebel XTi, at least. I also LUUUUUUUURVE that camera. My students laugh and say I'd take a bullet for it.

Too bad they're probably right! It has made my newspaper and yearbook teaching jobs SO much easier. Now if I just had a 70-200mm lens to take outside sporting event pictures....ah money.

[BailJumper]

The great thing about DSLR's is that with the LCD you can play with the settings` and see how it changes the image.

Man, don't buy anything from Epperson's unless you just have money to throw away. I go in there some, but just to look and touch something I am considering buying online.

I bought a Canon 5D that I use and got my wife a Olympus Evolt E-500.

Honestly, I spent 4x the $$$$ on mine that I spent on my wife's and I can't tell the difference in the prints.

You really can't beat the Evolt's price for a camera and two lenses.

I'd suggest any of the many good books available at Borders that walk a person through all of the basics of photography. The only catch is finding the function on your cameras menu.

[bandnerd]

Yeah, the flash thing made me really mad. I put it on my camera, and it's supposed to work with the camera easily...so I put it into program mode and started shooting...and got completely unusable, dark, sometimes black, photos. Took it back, told them I thought something was wrong with it. They put that flash on their model XTi and it worked fine. Told me it was my camera, so I sent it to Canon. They cleaned the sensor :P For free, luckily.

During that photo lesson I got, he put his Canon Speedlite flash and it worked great. It was nice to finally see for sure that I'm not totally photography-dumb OR crazy!

I plan on just ordering straight from the source from now on, or finding a reputable online source to buy my flashes and lenses from now on.

It was a $150 lesson well-learned, unfortunately.

[RussBraaten]

I do have a Fujifilm S 5100 which has a 10X zoom. I have a slave flash that I have not used much and I have a wide angle lens which I got for taking photos of indoor rooms. One thing that I have tried to do by the book is to manually focus the camera and I can't for the life of me make the focus change. I took family pix this past Thanksgiving and they were really grainy. I realized they were taken at 400 ASA. I also can't get motion photos to work either. I guess I am just frustrated. I won't buy a better camera until I figure this one out first.

I went into Epperson recently and got a monopod that was on sale. I hate going in there because their prices are really high and their people are really rude. I am surprised they are in business with the competition of the internet.

[Bobby H]

Dang. I saw a macro lens (macro photography is by far my favorite) for about $800 from Canon. 'Bout had a heart attack.

That's probably Canon's 180mm L-series macro lens. You're going to pay more for L-series glass. Actually the EF 100mm f/2.8 Macro lens costs around half that (a little over $400) and some consider it Canon's most fun per dollar lens.

The lenses that give me heart attack levels of sticker shock are the really big telephoto lenses, such as the EF 400mm f/2.8L IS. That monster is one of the best lenses one can use for sporting events, but it will set you back $6300. Canon's fastest portrait lenses, the EF 50mm f/1.2L and EF 85mm f/1.2L, cost $1600 and $1800 respectively.

My next lens will either be the EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 L IS telephoto zoom lens or the EF-S 10-22mm f/3.5-4.5 ultra wide angle zoom.

I bought a Canon 5D that I use and got my wife a Olympus Evolt E-500. Honestly, I spent 4x the $$$$ on mine that I spent on my wife's and I can't tell the difference in the prints.

What kind of lenses are you using with your EOS 5D? With some of the lenses I use on my camera, I'm seeing far better results than I have ever seen with any one-piece point and shoot digital camera.

Small point and shoot cameras can generate pretty decent quality photos. However, they're very limited on their autofocus capability, their image sensors are slower and they cannot shoot in a lot of conditions where a camera like the EOS 5D can (especially when that D-SLR body is paired with a very good lens).

I'll also repeat the recommendations of buying equipment online.

B&H Photo & Video in New York is a very good camera equipment store, probably as good as anyone can find anywhere. I would at least consider a retailer like them when it comes to buying lenses. They have a good return policy on any equipment that is bad. For a number of other items, I would probably start at Amazon.com and go from there.

A lot of "brick and mortar" stores just don't stay current on their pricing. I bought a 2GB SanDisk Ultra II compact flash card for my camera off Amazon.com for only $39. The Staples store near my home was selling the same exact card for $120! It pays to shop around.

I also can't get motion photos to work either. I guess I am just frustrated. I won't buy a better camera until I figure this one out first.

You need a fast enough lens and a camera with lots of ISO gain capability. The faster the lens the less you'll have to crank up the gain in the camera for stopping the action in photos. Even a lot of zoom lenses with f/2.8 apertures aren't fast enough for some indoor sports. An indoor basketball game may demand prime lenses with apertures of 1.8, 1.4 or even 1.2. Unfortunately, for the aperture to get bigger the lens needs bigger glass and results in a bigger price.

Canon's Digital Rebels can go to ISO 1600. The EOS 30D & 5D can do ISO 3200. The new EOS 1D Mark III has a ISO 6400 maximum setting. Cranking up the gain that much will result in noisy photos. However, it's better to have a noisy looking sports photograph with action stopped rather than have a smoother but blurred photo (unless blurred action is what you want in the image).

[CMSturgeon]

I bought a Kodak z740 about a year ago. Still don't know all the features it has. But on normal settings it takes pretty good photos. I'm about to buy a lens kit with 2 lenses in it and some other things (tripods, cleaner, etc). My husband found this website online, he is a bit of an amature himself, loves takes photographs. I think its photo.net - photo.net

[RussBraaten]

I went to the car show this past weekend and took a LOT of photos. Before I went I spend time reading my Fuji cameras manual and still got stuck just using the auto modes because I couldn't figure out the settings on my own. All the photos are a little bit out of focus but I couldn't see that on the LCD viewer Even after trying many times in my living room, I could not get the manual focus to work. I am very frustrated. I want a better camera but not until I learn how to use the one I have.

[RussBraaten]

Does anyone know of a place to get a few hours of training reasonably?

[dirtrider73068]

If its out of focus(blurry) you may be moveing or shaking a little, digi cams can be sensitive to movement when a pic is taken, I found out the hard way. I have a canon power shot A60 that does real good even with very slight movement my pics come out clear.

[bandnerd]

Russ--

Go to Pipkin photo. It's at 30th and Classenish. I called the other day for some flash pricings and ended up getting a free 10-minute photo lesson over the phone lol. We talked about apertures, shutter speeds, and how to photograph people with dark skin (a unique problem I have run into repeatedly at my diverse school!) My sister did business with them years back when she was learning film photography and she was very happy with them. And they won't rip you off...like some stores...

[Bobby H]

I went to the car show this past weekend and took a LOT of photos. All the photos are a little bit out of focus but I couldn't see that on the LCD viewer Even after trying many times in my living room, I could not get the manual focus to work.

With small point and shoot cameras, it's usually best to stick with the auto focus modes. The LCD viewfinders in those cameras don't show enough detail in the display to tell the user reliably when the picture is really in or out of focus. The bad thing about auto-focus systems is that bright light sources can throw off the infrared sensor.

Russ, was the car show you were attending held indoors? Lots of indoor settings lit with fluorescent lights can be very demanding of any digital camera.

In a lot of indoor situations the light levels are low enough that any camera will take noticeably longer to capture an image. Sometimes you'll even get pretty serious lag as the image is being recorded. That's going to make factors like hand-held camera shake more critical and increase the chances you'll end up with blurry photos.

D-SLR cameras can crank up the gain for faster shooting speeds to eliminate camera shake. Most point and shoot cameras don't have the ability to do the same.

The best thing to do is mount the digital camera on a tripod, frame up the shot and use the timer function. The timer eliminates the problem of your finger moving the camera when the picture is taken. Instead, the exposure is taken with the camera perfectly still. Your only other alternative in low light situations is using a flash. Sadly, flash photos from one piece point and shoot cameras usually don't look very good.

Lots of people think 1/60 of a second is fast enough for shooting speed. That's not really true. 1/60 might be fine for a wide angle lens. But if you are using a zoom lens and are zoomed out to a pretty long zoom setting, you will need shooting speeds of perhaps 1/200 or better to eliminate camera shake. When shooting sports, you often need 1/500 or faster to eliminate any blur in the action. The average point and shoot camera can't deliver that kind of performance. It typically requires a good D-SLR and very fast lens.

[bandnerd]

^^ Agreed.

1/60 (I'm still learning here, too) is fine for a lot of situations, but not all. Especially inside with moving objects!

[RussBraaten]

My camera will shoot as fast as 1/2000 but I have no idea how to use fast settings to take pictures. Lets say I use 1/500 shutter speed, What type of ISO and apertures should I use for photos where there is movement. This is where I get lost. Here are the abilities of my camera

# Shutter speeds range from 1/2,000 to 15 seconds.
# Adjustable apertures from f/2.8 to f/8.
# ISO settings include Auto, 64, 100, 200, and 400.

I am a nice single guy, any camera smart woman want to go out on what we can call a teaching date? Bwahahahaha

[bandnerd]

From what I understand, you lose light when you up the shutter speed, so you have to adjust the aperture to a more open number or bump up the ISO to adjust for the loss of light. I usually try and do a light check before I start photographing whatever event I'm at so I'll have a general idea of what I'm going to get.

Now, if you were taking a picture of a fountain and wanted the water to be all blurry and smooth-looking, you'd put the camera on a tripod and let the shutter sit open for awhile. Maybe 3 seconds. Plenty of light already coming in so the aperture would be lower and you could lower the ISO.

With an ISO of 400 the pictures shouldn't be too grainy (they lose quality when you make prints with higher ISO settings) but if you can get away with 100 or 200 the photo will probably look better.

I think lol. I might be wrong but I think that's how I understand it!

[Bobby H]

Both the camera's aperture and shutter speed affect how much light is getting to the imaging sensor chip.

I would say the aperture has an even greater affect on this. It functions very much like the iris in a person's eye, dilating wide in low light and contracting to a very small circle in bright light.

The shutter speed simply governs exposure time. At each aperture setting a certain exposure time is needed. With the aperture closed down tight one will need a much longer exposure time than what would be required if the aperture were wide open.

To repeat what I said earlier, the aperture also affects "depth of field". A tight aperture like f/8.0 will have a very large depth of field, but will require much longer exposure times. That kind of setting is fine when your subjects are very still and you have a tripod. A very large aperture like f/2.8 in the best zoom lenses and f/1.2 in the best primes will get a lot more light into the lens. You'll be able to use much faster shutter speeds to stop action without having to crank up ISO settings. But you get a much narrow level of depth of field. Only your subject will be in focus and everything else in the background will be blurred. If the subject is close only part of it will be in focus. Sometimes that dreamy effect is a desirable thing.

Most point and shoot one piece digital cameras don't have very good ISO gain functions. Many yield noisy pictures when ISO ratings are cranked past 200 or more.

D-SLR camera sensors are more advanced. They have more intelligent circuitry to combat noise. They also can go far higher in ISO gain without pictures becoming noticeably grainy. But beware, any camera can have color shifting problems when the ISO gain is cranked past the normal 100 level. In such situations it may be better to manually white balance and shoot in RAW format so you have more control over adjusting and correcting the image later in applications like Adobe Lightroom.

The ISO level is something one should only use as a last resort to gain a faster shutter speed needed to stop action and/or maintain a certain level of depth of field.

Generally speaking, if someone is shooting pictures of indoor basketball games or other events of that sort, they will need a good D-SLR camera and a pretty effective prime lens, such as a 50mm f/1.4 or 85mm f/1.8 to get good action stopping shutter speeds under such light challenged conditions. Affordable level point and shoot digital cameras just don't have the performance to get the job done well in that area.

[Oh GAWD the Smell!]

Hey looky here! A singles forum!

And you're talking about DSLR's!

I gots me one of them thar things! A Konica-Minolta 7D to be exact. I chose it because all of my Minolta Maxxum glass from way back when works perfectly on it...Saved me a couple of thousand in lenses. Of course, right after I bought it, they sold to Sony. Figures.

Oh well, it takes great pictures in auto, and with a 6gb microdrive, I can play with all the settings and take 427 metric tons of bad pictures to get one great one.

I've also got a Fuji Finepix that I've taken some amazing pictures with as well. But I'm afraid that camera is on about it's last leg (I'm pretty hard on small cameras), and is about to be retired and replaced as the "in the backpack while riding camera" with something hopefully every bit as robust as it showed itself to be over the last few years, and see if I can't make an even longer sentence with a description of that camera in it, whenever I get around to purchasing it.

[RussBraaten]

OGTS

Which Finepix have you been using? I got the S5100 because my old GF had a cheap point and shoot model Finepix and the photos came out great.