Digital Camera Setting Suggestions – Part 1 of 2

Great weather usually means more time spent outdoors, which often means taking more pictures… If you haven’t begun to play with all the different aspects of your digital camera – now’s a perfect time to begin.

With websites like www.youtube.com  and www.ehow.com  and those for your specific cameras, you can find both print and video tutorials that will help you master each and every aspect of your digital camera…

In the meantime, here are some highlights of some of the standard settings for most digital cameras – remember experiment and play with your camera – it’s the best way to learn…

Action Mode Setting – Icon usually looks like a man running and can help with shots of action, children playing, sports, etc and you want to change to this setting prior to taking your pictures; if you don’t have this setting most cameras allow you to change them to Manual Setting, icon is usually a capital '"M." and then Set your camera to a fast shutter speed setting such as 1/250th, 1/500th or 1/1000th of a second – most cameras today do this automatically when set on "Shutter Priority, icon is usually a capital "S." Remember to turn off your flash and change the ISO setting to 400-800.. to get great action shots


Burst Mode or Continuous Shooting Mode Setting – Icon looks like several pieces of paper stacked up and this setting helps reduce shutter lag and lets you take several pictures by pressing the shutter button just once. This will help you make sure that you get at least one good shot of an action sequence. If it isn’t on the top dial, then go to the cameras menu setting to make this change on the LCD screen looking for the same icon. When you shoot in continuous mode, be sure to focus your camera on the subject you want to capture and hold down the shutter button without releasing it. The camera takes pictures until you stop pressing the shutter button or the buffer memory or memory card fills up.
Notes about continuous shoots:

• Be sure you have a fully charged battery when you plan to do “continuous shooting”
• Continuous shot images are typically first stored in the internal memory buffer on your camera, because writing data to the buffer is faster than writing data to the memory card. By initially storing the image in the buffer, the camera is able to take another picture much more quickly than if the image is written directly to the card. Writing the data to the memory buffer also allows in-camera image processing to occur before the final image is saved to the card usually stored on the Cameras Internal Memory Buffer before putting them on the Memory Card. i.e. the buffer may fill up after 10-14 pictures in Fine/Large/JPEG mode, or after three pictures in RAW mode. The LCD display shows "Busy" when the buffer is full, and shows "Full CF" when the memory card is full . Once the information has been converted to a digital form, it is stored in the camera's internal-memory buffer. Image data is initially stored in the memory buffer because writing data to the buffer is faster than writing data to the memory card. By initially storing the image in the buffer, the camera is able to take another picture much more quickly than if the image is written directly to the card. Writing the data to the memory buffer also allows in-camera image processing to occur before the final image is saved to the card

ISO Settings – these can be changed to control how much light goes into your camera and it’s easy and can make a vast difference in the “brightness” of your photos… Change to the lowest possible setting as noted… By default, the standard Automatic ISO setting in most digital cameras is 200..
Other settings you might want to try would be..
50-100: for photos taken in very bright light
200: for photos when it is overcast
400: for photos taken indoors or with action
800: for photos with continuous shot action


Post continued in Part 2 of 2 on Thursday, April 12th, 2012

What are the ISO settings for in my digital camera?

ISO settings are the measurement of how sensitive your digital camera's sensor is to light. The speed or light-sensitivity of a digital camera's sensor is rated in ISO numbers -- the lower the number, the slower the response to light.

Generally, we get the best picture quality by using the lowest ISO setting (such as 100 or 200). Higher ISO settings, such as 800, enable us to shoot in lower light situations with faster shutter speeds..

Higher ISO setting numbers indicate a higher sensitivity to light, so less time is needed to expose a picture. Most digital cameras let us control the ISO setting to allow the use of higher shutter speeds and/or smaller apertures, according to circumstances

Memory cards are so inexpensive today, that it’s worth having an extra one so that you can get out and shoot as much as you can in as many different circumstances. Don't be afraid to try different exposure settings and use the different settings available on your specific camera model. The more you experiment taking lots of different photos, the more comfortable you will get understanding your camera and what works for the types of pictures you want to take. 

Check your manufacturer’s website for their video tutorial and also check YouTube for more help learning to use your specific camera model.

TIPS TO TAKE GREAT FIREWORK PHOTOS

By Suzanne Kantra, Techlicious.com (July 2011)

Wanted to be sure you didn't miss this great article, which was posted on the following website... some great tips to help with taking awesome photos of fireworks-have a safe & happy 4th of July holiday...

COPIED FROM: http://digitallife.today.com/_news/2011/06/30/6976038-take-sparkling-photos-on-the-fourth-of-july?gt1=43001

Heading out with the family for HOLIDAY fireworks celebrations is a time-honored tradition. And, if you're like me, you enjoy capturing those memories in pictures. But photographing fireworks with no camera shake and proper exposure is difficult, unless you know these simple tricks.

1. Use a tripod
When you take picture of fireworks, the camera needs to hold the shutter open long enough to “see” the fireworks. The longer the shutter is open, the more susceptible your photo is to motion blur. So use a tripod to make sure there’s no movement. For open areas, use a stand-alone model with telescoping legs like the Dolica AX620B100 Proline ($36 on amazon.com). A more mobile option is the Joby Gorillapod original ($19.95 on joby.com), which can wrap around trees and poles or stand up on the ground.

2. Use the “fireworks” scene mode
Most point-and-shoot cameras have a button or dial with “SCN” or “Scene” on it. Otherwise you’ll find it under the “menu” button. When you put your camera in scene mode, a list of the available modes will pop up on screen. Select the one that looks like a spray of fireworks and/or says "fireworks". Most cameras sold today have a "fireworks" option for scenes. Some models I recommend include the Canon PowerShot A3300IS (an affordable 16MP camera with a 5x lens, $179 on usa.canon.com), Panasonic Lumix DMC-TS3 (an extremely rugged 12MP camera, $399 on panasonic.com) and the Fujifilm FinePix HS20 (a 16MP camera with a monster 30x wide-angle lens, $425 on amazon.com).

3. If your camera doesn’t have a “fireworks” mode, put it in “landscape” mode
Your camera automatically tries to find an object on which to focus. And when presented with a black featureless sky, the camera doesn’t know what to do. By putting your camera in “landscape” mode, you’ll be presetting the focus to infinity and narrowing the lens opening, which keeps both near and far objects in focus.

4. Turn off the flash
Turning your flash off will let the camera know that it only has available light to take a picture. This is important because the camera will then keep the shutter open long enough to capture the fireworks. The flash button is usually a separate button on the back of the camera. On some cameras, you can’t turn off the flash unless you put it in a scene mode or program mode (P).

5. Turn down the ISO
High ISO will crank up the sensitivity of the camera so it can see details in the dark. However, the fireworks themselves are quite bright. So, to avoid overexposure and reduce film noise, take your camera out of Auto ISO and change the setting to ISO 100 or even lower. The ISO setting is usually found under the main menu. You may have to put your camera in program mode to change this setting.

Digital Camera Terms & Tips

Some common digital camera terms we hear and what they mean:

ISO: Traditionally used as an indicator of sensitivity for film cameras, ISO on modern digital cameras represents the camera’s sensitivity to light. Generally, the darker the scene, the higher the ISO should be set.

APERTURE: The aperture, or “f-stop” to the film purists, is the amount of light the lens lets into the camera. This can be adjusted in single-lens reflex cameras. The aperture is fixed for most point-and-shoots.

IMAGE STABILIZATION: This refers to a part of the digital camera, built into the body or the lens, that prevents “camera shake” in pictures.

DIGITAL/OPTICAL ZOOM:

• OPTICAL ZOOM refers to the manual zoom on a camera, which is located on the lens. Twisting the lens moves it closer to the subject. This is important – they higher the optical zoom the more “zoom” ability you have – 3x optical zoom was common, but today many cameras have 10x & 12x zoom..
• DIGITAL ZOOM is not used by moving the lens, rather it is part of the software of the camera. Most digital cameras – even point-and-shoots – have a form of both. Many consider digital zoom – camera hype…

CONTINUOUS PHOTO SPEED/BUFFER: Every digital camera has continuous photo speed; the number you set it on is the number of photos you can take per second. The faster the camera’s continuous speed, the more photos you can get per second.