- Understanding How Lenses Work
- Manipulating Exposure Controls
- Learning Workarounds for Camera Settings
- Caring for Digital Cameras
- Summary
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
Learning Workarounds for Camera Settings
Digital photographers at all levels have an advantage shared only by those professionals who do their own color darkroom work. If you have to make compromises when you shoot your pictures, you can almost always improve your work after you upload it to the computer. Having said that, I should also point out that you'll be able to do much more with a picture if it's good to begin with.
Focus Workarounds
Rule number one for keeping your pictures in focus, no matter what kind of camera you use, is to hold it steady. If your exposure is likely to be longer than 1/60th of a second, find something to brace yourself against, use a tripod, or at the very least, learn the photographer's crunch.
This is a position that becomes second nature after a while. Begin by standing with your feet a little wider apart than normal, so you've got a good firm footing under you. Hold the camera with both hands, and press your upper arms and elbows into your ribs, as shown in Figure 3.13. If you need a low angle, sit, kneel, or lie down, with your elbows firmly braced. As you look through the viewfinder, rest the camera against your nose. If your camera uses an LCD view screen instead of a viewfinder, hold it at a comfortable viewing distance away, but again with your elbows and upper arms pressed tight to your body. Just before you press the shutter, stop breathing for a second or two.
If your camera has a fixed focus lens, you're going to need to do some experimenting. Start by memorizing the information that came with the camera about focus distances. You'll probably find something like "Focus Distance: two feet (0.5m) to infinity." Common sense tells you that nothing is going to be in perfect focus at both two feet and infinity. You can safely assume that they're referring to reasonably acceptable depth of field, rather than focal point. Knowing that, you can therefore determine that the actual focal point is probably somewhere around 6–8 feet.
Take a few test pictures with a subject at that distance, and see if they're acceptably sharp. Then try a couple at 4 feet and 10 feet, and see what differences, if any, you can notice. You can "sharpen" pictures in the computer, too, by using the tools in a program such as Adobe Photoshop Elements or Jasc Paint Shop Pro.
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Figure
3.13 Holding the camera steady.
Autofocus cameras have their own set of problems, as previously noted. The main thing to remember when you use an autofocus camera is that the focusing mechanism is aimed at the center of the frame. If you're shooting a couple, it's entirely possible that the camera may try to focus through the gap between the people. Focus on one or the other, lock the focus if possible, recompose, and shoot before you let go of the focus lock, so the subjects stay in focus.
If you know that your autofocus camera uses sonar focusing, don't try to take pictures through a closed window. The sound waves bounce off the glass, and give you a perfectly focused window, with a blur beyond it (see Figure 3.14). This sometimes happens with infrared autofocus cameras, too, although a few seem to be able to look past the glass. The best workaround for this is to open the window!
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Figure
3.14 D'oh! If I'd rolled the window down, this would have been a
nice shot.
TIP
If you must shoot through a closed window, as on a train or bus, hold the camera so it's at an angle to the glass. Then, infrared or sonic waves from the focusing device will bounce away from the camera instead of back at it, and the camera will autofocus at infinity, which is exactly what you want it to do.
If you're shooting a group of people or a scattering of objects such as a field of flowers and need as much depth of field as possible, focus about a third of the way back. Doing so will take advantage of as much sharpness as your lens can provide. Similarly, if you have two subjects—one at 6 feet away and the other at 12 feet—your focus should be at 8 feet, in order to take full advantage of the rule that depth of focus extends one-third in front of the focal point and two-thirds behind it.
Flash Workarounds
Cameras with built-in flash are very useful in certain situations. Obviously, when you're shooting indoors and haven't enough light, the flash fills in. You can also use it outdoors when you need a little extra light on a subject that's backlit or in shade. Some photographers are reluctant to use built-in flash, for several reasons. Having the flash mounted on the camera produces a flat, head-on light with no modeling effect. The roundness of the subject is lost. This isn't so bad if the subject is a piece of furniture, but if you're shooting a portrait, the effect may make it look more like a mug shot (see Figure 3.15).
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Figure
3.15 Notice the shadow directly behind his head.
With built-in flash, there are no shadows to add contour to the face. In fact, the only shadow you'll see is cast on the background right behind the subject's head. It may even merge with the head to the point where you can't tell what's hair and what's wall. The cure for this is quite simple. Place the subject between three and six feet in front of the background. This gives room for the shadow to fall harmlessly out of the way, and still sheds enough light on the background so that your subject won't appear to be looming out of a hole (see Figure 3.16). To avoid the flat look, have the subject turn his or her head slightly to one side.
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Figure
3.16 Moving the subject away from the background keeps the shadow out of the
picture.
TIP
Use the same trick described in Figure 3.16 if you're shooting outdoors in the sun. Move the subjects far enough away from vertical surfaces so that their shadows aren't part of the picture.
Another problem with the built-in flash is that it casts bright highlights on reflective subjects. Occasionally, this effect is good, but sometimes the highlight is just too much glare. To soften it, tape a single layer of tissue over the flash, taking care that the tape and/or tissue doesn't interfere with the lens, meter, or anything else. The tissue should diffuse the light just enough to block the glare, without darkening the picture noticeably. Figure 3.17shows before and after examples.
A related problem is called "red eye" when it affects people and "green eye" when it affects animals. If the subject's pupils are wide open, as they tend to be in dim light, and you take a flash picture, the light reflects off the backs of the retinas and into the camera lens (see Figure 3.18). It's easy enough to fix in an image editing program like Photoshop Elements, but it's easier still to avoid it. Simply have the subject look somewhere other than at the camera. If that's not possible, for example if the shot has to be face forward, turn up the room lights as bright as possible, so the pupils of the subject's eyes are already as small as possible.
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Figure
3.17 The picture on the left was shot without tissue. The one on the right
used the tissue to diffuse the light. Notice the harsher shadows in the picture
on the left.
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Figure
3.18 Red eye is caused by light bouncing off the subject's retinas and
back into the camera.
Exposure Workarounds
In general in digital photography, it's better to underexpose than to overexpose. If your pictures are a little too dark, you can usually lighten them enough to bring out the detail. If you have overexposed your picture, there's frequently no way to save it. The detail just isn't there. Use "bad" pictures to experiment with special effects. The photo in Figure 3.19 was shot just about at dawn. In the uncorrected version on the top, the details are lost in the darkness. Photoshop Elements's auto correct brought back most of the detail, and saved this one.
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Figure
3.19 Lighthouse at dawn.
Remember that you can correct for color temperature. If all you have available is fluorescent light, use it. If your subject's skin tones pick up a greenish cast from the lights, you can fix it later. If you have a couple of clip-on lights, but only standard household bulbs, go ahead and use them. A warm portrait is better than a dark one.
If you're planning to shoot pictures outdoors, be sure to consider the time of day and angle of the sun. You won't get a flattering portrait at high noon with the sun directly overhead, but you get better architectural shots then. Shoot the scenery midday, and save the people pictures for later, as the sunlight warms up and the sun's angle casts shadows.
If your camera enables you to see what you have shot, always stop and check after one or two pictures in a particular setting. You may decide to turn on another light or open a curtain. If you're outdoors, you may decide to move from sunlight to open shade, or to move so that the sun is over your shoulder.