Help - Manual Settings.
Discussion
As you will all have gathered I am very new to this photography business. My camera has some settings which I can fiddle around with and I understand a few of them but 2 confuse me.
Can anyone give any advice on the following and in which circumstances I should change them and what they should be changed to?
I could RTFM but trying to understand English translated from Japenese gets tricky!!
1. A. Priority. This has settings 'Auto', F2.8, F4.8 & F8.2
2. EV. This has 0 - Default and then increments of 0.3 in a minus and plus range down to -2.1 and up to +1.5
I'm sure I could get better pictures with a little knowledge of what these do.
As always TIA.
Can anyone give any advice on the following and in which circumstances I should change them and what they should be changed to?
I could RTFM but trying to understand English translated from Japenese gets tricky!!
1. A. Priority. This has settings 'Auto', F2.8, F4.8 & F8.2
2. EV. This has 0 - Default and then increments of 0.3 in a minus and plus range down to -2.1 and up to +1.5
I'm sure I could get better pictures with a little knowledge of what these do.
As always TIA.
.Mark said:
1. A. Priority. This has settings 'Auto', F2.8, F4.8 & F8.2
2. EV. This has 0 - Default and then increments of 0.3 in a minus and plus range down to -2.1 and up to +1.5
A correct exposure is a balance of aperture (the size of hole the light goes through) and shutter speed (how long the hole is open for. Most cameras use a Program mode which juggles both for you. Sometimes it's nice to be able to set priorities though. Aperture priority means you set the size of the aperture and camera will work out the appropriate shuter speed. f2.8 is a big aperture, f16 is small. Shutter speed priority is the opposite.
Why bother and which one to use? Aperture controls depth-of-field (DOF)- sometimes you might want a big DOF, at other times small. Shutter speed is simpler to grasp - if you want to freeze fast motion, or deliberately blur it, set the shutter speed and the camera does the aperture.
EV is exposure compensation. You can set this to change the overall exposure (amount of light reaching the lens), either less or more by using - or +. It's useful for when the camera's own meter gets 'fooled' by low sun, snow etc.
To see what difference these things have, try shotting the same scene with various settings and see the result.
Enjoy!
Thanks Simpo,
So if I read this properly, to take a shot of a race car for instance I would need to set the Aperture Priority to f8.2, (mine doesn't have shutter speed (I don't think)) this would automatically adjust the shutter speed to a faster setting?? (If it follows that you set the shutter speed it does the aperture).
And if they are racing on an ice field surrounded by snowy mountains in full sunlight, I need to set the EV as negative as possible??
So if I read this properly, to take a shot of a race car for instance I would need to set the Aperture Priority to f8.2, (mine doesn't have shutter speed (I don't think)) this would automatically adjust the shutter speed to a faster setting?? (If it follows that you set the shutter speed it does the aperture).
And if they are racing on an ice field surrounded by snowy mountains in full sunlight, I need to set the EV as negative as possible??
.Mark said:
Thanks Simpo,
So if I read this properly, to take a shot of a race car for instance I would need to set the Aperture Priority to f8.2, (mine doesn't have shutter speed (I don't think)) this would automatically adjust the shutter speed to a faster setting?? (If it follows that you set the shutter speed it does the aperture).
Other way around, f/8.2 is a small aperture, f/2.8 is large . . . it's a ratio, the focal length divided by the size of the hole, so the bigger the hole the smaller the number, and the faster the shutter speed will need to be.
.Mark said:
And if they are racing on an ice field surrounded by snowy mountains in full sunlight, I need to set the EV as negative as possible??
I presume the "EV" to which you refer is your exposure compensation - setting it negative will make the picture darker, positive, lighter. Your camera will always try to make everything middle grey, so when it sees a white subject it will underexpose to get to the middle grey. The solution is to dial in + exposure compensation, usually between +1 and +2.
>> Edited by Alien on Thursday 18th December 22:14
.Mark said:
to take a shot of a race car for instance I would need to set the Aperture Priority to f8.2, (mine doesn't have shutter speed (I don't think)) this would automatically adjust the shutter speed to a faster setting?? (If it follows that you set the shutter speed it does the aperture).
Alien beat me to it!
.Mark said:
And if they are racing on an ice field surrounded by snowy mountains in full sunlight, I need to set the EV as negative as possible??
Nope, as Alien said your camera will be foxed by all that white snow and reduce exposure accordingly. Hence, to get the snow nice and white again, you need to increase exposure, ie +EV. However, you may then find that the people come out as black blobs, so try the auto setting first and see if you like the results before you tinker!
>> Edited by Simpo Two on Thursday 18th December 23:10
Another useful rule of thumb is that if you want blur-free photos when hand-holding your camera then you should use a shutter speed greater than the focal length of your lens (by that I mean the shutter speed number should be bigger than the lens focal length).
For example, if you are using a 90mm lens, then you should use a shutter speed of 1/125 second or quicker.
A 350mm lens would required a shutter speed of 1/500 second or quicker, and a 50mm lens would require a shutter speed of 1/60 second or quicker.
Some cameras and lenses have image stabilisation, so you can drop a couple of settings and still get sharp photos.
I'm no expert, so I've probably not described this particularly well.
waits for someone who knows what they are talking about to step in...
For example, if you are using a 90mm lens, then you should use a shutter speed of 1/125 second or quicker.
A 350mm lens would required a shutter speed of 1/500 second or quicker, and a 50mm lens would require a shutter speed of 1/60 second or quicker.
Some cameras and lenses have image stabilisation, so you can drop a couple of settings and still get sharp photos.
I'm no expert, so I've probably not described this particularly well.
waits for someone who knows what they are talking about to step in...
.Mark said:
Nope, seems to make sense. Thing is I don't have the shutter speed setting to adjust.
It does have an automatic 'Sport' mode, which is OK, but I'm sure I could improve it by doing it manually. If I knew what I was doing.
You're almost there. Sport mode will give you faster shutter speed and accordingly bigger aperture. Perhaps your camera will let you see what shutter speed is actually selected? If so, as you rightly suggested, you can use Aperture priority to change sutter speed indirectly. If it was an SLR, you'd be able to turn the aperture ring/thumbwheel and see the shutter speed going up and down to suit. Just experiment and see how it goes.
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