Photography TipsDigital photography free tutorials!Our photography tips will help you gain knowledge and confidence for taking better photographs!Do you already know you are a great photographer? Skip over to here and learn how to make money with digital photography! When you look at your work do you see amateur photos? Well, no more, our basic digital photography instructions can help! Your camera comes with factory settings, but our digital photography tips will help you enjoy more creativity, and give you the confidence to get out of automatic mode. It won't matter what brand you are using most slr digital photography cameras have the same functions.
Your Camera's SettingsOur beginning photography tips start here:(refer to your camera's instruction manual for location on your camera) Selecting the AF MODE: For most practical purposes your camera is best on Al FOCUS. This allows you to take shots of still or moving subjects, or more importantly if your still subject begins to move. As you become more comfortable with changing settings for each condition you will want to take advantage of ONE SHOT for still subjects (nice for wedding photography too), or Al SERVO (fast moving kids or subjects), but for now you want a setting for your camera that will allow you to relax knowing you are in the right mode so go with Al FOCUS. Selecting the AF POINT: The AF POINT is used for focusing it is best to select the CENTER selection. This will allow you to focus on the subject of your choice. Remember if you are in automatic mode the camera will decide for you and these suggestions will not make any difference. The purpose of these selections is to give you some photography tips to get you out of automatic mode. Selecting the METERING MODE: The camera will automatically choose EVALUATIVE METERING go with this. It will be the best choice in manual mode as well. Selecting the ISO: For now we are going to choose 400. If you get into the habit of always checking this setting before you shoot I will encourage you to select 100/200 in very bright conditions, but again for an all round general setting for your camera (if you don't want to change it every time) go with 400. Selecting the DRIVE MODE: I love the expressions and series I get from continuous shooting, but if you are using a speedlight you will need to choose single shooting so you don't burn out your external flash unit, and as you already know with photography equipment...everything is a little pricey! Selecting the IMAGE PLAY BACK MODE: Make sure you can see your histogram! The newer cameras offer a larger screen (very nice), but still get into the habit of checking the histogram. It is much faster to see where your light is than taking the time to evaluate the little picture, and if your eyesight isn't as keen as mine you will appreciate your friend the histogram! Selecting the COLOR SPACE: Select sRGB. You might want to check the difference with how your image looks using your choice of photo processing software. I use Photoshop and do not know the others personally. Selecting the WHITE BALANCE: The safe selection is "Auto". Again for very specific purposes you will want to try the other settings, but if you are shooting in constantly changing conditions or chasing fast kids...shade...sun...shade you need to be in auto. The color temperature is a range of 3000-7000. This is the flexibility you will need. However; if you know you will be indoors using a flash select "flash", if you are in direct sunlight, shade or over cast these selections make a difference and are an easy adjustment to remember. Selecting the IMAGE-RECORDING QUALITY: Although Photoshop now processes a jpeg images as if it is raw...I still like raw. I have more creative choices in Photoshop if I choose raw. However, if you are using smaller CF cards that are limited in size or don't have the means to purchase the larger cards choose JPEG (large fine), or if you don't use the new versions of Photoshop and your image processing doesn't see raw you will need to go with JPEG. A little digital photography tip trick if you use raw for a shoot or event and are nervous about running out of space glance at your digital photography memory cards and switch to jpeg in the end to give yourself more space.
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