Lessons

Lesson Info

Camera Operation

So now we're ready to move on to camera operations on dh, so I need everyone to wiggle their fingers to make sure they're all ready to go, because we're going to start moving the cameras. And if you're busy typing away on the computers, you're going to probably want to grab your cameras and start working with your cameras because this is going to be a little bit of a test. First off, we went through a little bit of a set up at the beginning of class for re make sure the batteries were charged and our cameras were firing have memory cards in there and things like that and so there's a little bit more full setup that you want to go through before you go shoot your best friend's wedding or you go on vacation or you take a really important job first office format. The memory card this clears off any extra data on that card that might cause a communication problem with your camera so before any important job format the memory card. But before you do that, make sure you've downloaded any imp...

ortant information off of that card next up, make sure the time and date is set properly for the time zone and time that you are. In you, this is going to be attributed to all your photos. Once you take them, there are programs where you can adjust for it later on, but it's better to have it right, right at the beginning, attach the strap, adjust that diop, turn knob to make sure it's clear for you to see through the viewfinder. Make sure that you have your camera set to the property image quality, whether that's raw, jpeg combination of him personally, I like raw, because that way you're getting the best information possible. Go through this menu city system if we went through it too fast and you want to go through and adjust it, go through the playback, the shooting, the set menu to make sure that the camera's adjusted to the way you like it. Toe work. I would shoot some test photos and make sure that there's no major dust issues on the camera. It's not a big issue, but it's better to get this checked out before you embark on a serious project. So shoot a blank white wall at f twenty two and zoom in and look around for big, old black specks, which is what they will look like. So once you have done that, we are ready to embark on your test, so what I have done is, I have look the camera over and I've kind of come to my own determination of what I think the ten most important features are and so as I bring these up kind of thing where they are the exposure mode how do you change your shutter speed? How do you change your aperture? You're so settings exposure compensation how would you change that? Where do you get to your meeting with white balance focusing a f area mode and finally the drive mode these air ten modes that you're going to be using on a regular basis so to start off with let's, do a simple setup of your camera so follow along folks, here we go set it to p for programme mode that's the dial on the top will set it to p we don't have to worry about shutter speeds and apertures, but we do in this case we're going to set our cameras to esso auto now this one is actually a little hard to get teo we have to go into the menu system and go over to the shooting menu down to I s o sensitivity settings and go down to auto eso sensitivity and turn it on this would be a little bit of pain because we're going to come back and turn this off for everything else normally when it put it there but for the super simple mode that's what we're doing exposure, compensation let's make sure that is at zero and that shows up in the back of your camera on your information display and here we can see the plus and minus sign and right next to that is zero before warned that the box right next to it has a lightning bolt and plus minus and that is your flash exposure. We're not concerned about that right now just the plus minus. If it is incorrect, you have the plus minus button on the top you can go in, press that button in and turn your command wheel to change that setting. Next up I'm eatery now these next several features are going to be located in the information screen on the back of the camera so you can either hit the shutter release or the I button to get the screen activated and here were looking for me during which is this little symbol right here it does say me tearing up in the corner, you press ok and you can select between matrix center waited and spot and we want matrix, so we're set there. The next setting we want is white balance, which is up a few steps from that here in the information display white balance we wanted auto this is where I have it now there's, lots of other settings, but we're going to leave it in auto the focus mode we need to set this to single focus and this is thie a f focus mode so we have the option of a f a s or c and we want single focus right below that is your f area mode and we want auto area hit here which is the bottom of the three options, so make sure you're in the auto area mode and go to the bottom of the three options and select that one and finally the drive mode we want it single and this always throws people off because we've been working in the menu but now it's the actual lever on the top of the camera that's really easy to get to sew up that s for single shot and so if you had to give the camera to somebody else who didn't know about photography or if you just wanted to go out and shoot basic pictures there's pretty much nothing you could do teo manipulate the camera at this point you just go out and take pictures s o that's the super simple set up but it's not one that I recommend for anyone who wants to take control of their cameras so let's let's take it up a notch and set the camera up the way an enthusiast a photography enthusiast might set it up so in this case let's change your ap your your um odile two aperture priority so we'll turn the mod I'll t a and now we don't worry about shutter speed still, but we do need to be concerned about aperture. So just for kicks, let's set the aperture to f four. If you have it now, an aperture priority to changed f or you simply turn the dial on the back of the camera and you're changing the f number and if you have f or you can go all the way down to that, go ahead and set f for once that is set, we're going to turn off that auto I s oh, so we do need to dive back into the menu system and luckily it's, the last place we were at so it's pretty easy to get teo, we're going to go into the shooting menu hy s o sensitivity settings go to the right auto aya so sensitivity. Go to the right, turn it off and press ok, I would then come back to the information screen that we see here, press the information button and go up to s o and make sure that that is set at one hundred. Your choices will be between one hundred and high too we want it at one hundred. The next setting is let's make sure the exposure compensation has said it zero, which is where it was in the last time around, so we probably don't need to check that too closely. The meeting system is in majors matrix same as we were before but we can go through and double check because it is right there metering and it is indeed in matrix white balance is going to be an auto so let's go up to the w b for white balance and it is still at auto so that's good for focus we're going to have this in single focus the focus mode a f s is what we want here now this is where we're going to make a little bit of a change last time we were in auto area this time we want to change to single point so right below the s is where we can go in and change it to a single point auto focus we are now locked in on one point and we can choose where that point iss and finally single drive, which is once again on the top of the camera right there on single all right, we're going to be doing this for a number of different set up so that you could get familiar with all the features the important features of your camera now we're going to do it old school style retro style so if you're an old school shooter, you might like to shoot manual so let's go into the manual mode em for manual now we need to select shutter speeds and apertures and so let's see if you could go to one hundred twenty fifth of a second by turning the dial on the back of the camera to one slash one. Twenty fifth do that myself and now we need to change your aperture. Do you remember how to change the aperture change the aperture toe f ate remember you have to press in on that plus minus button up the top of the camera f ate because there's a good old saying and photography that says, how do you take a great picture? F ate and be there it's a good aperture for a lot of things. Next up, let's change theis o two, four hundred we pressed the information button, navigate upto eso and adjust that two, four hundred and press ok, when we're done, I s o is now at four hundred. We're not going to worry about exposure compensation for this one, but we're going to change to center waited metering so in the information display we go down to the meat, a ring system and we're gonna move it down one notch to center waited, impress, okay, white balance we're going to leave it auto, which is where it was before. I'll just double check that it's there it is, indeed, in auto, so we're good on that focus mode. Manual shooters like manual focus lenses so let's, switch it to manual focus by actually going to the lands and switching it from a to em. So now the lenses in manual focus and we can turn the focusing ring on the lands to focus. We don't worry about a f area mode because we're manually focusing, but let's move the drive mode to continue so we can take pictures as fast as our camera will allow. And if we listen to the camera, you can hear its firing about three point seven frames per second, I believe. All right, so now this is a test, a test of the emergency camera operating system to see if you know where all the buttons are in your camera. So this is how no one would ever set their camera, but just so that you're familiar with where everything is. Set your camera to shutter priority quick, move that model. I want you to select a shutter speed of one half of a second, so you got to move that dial all the way down to one slash two that is a half second we're not going to worry about the aperture on this one but I do want you to bump your s o all the way up to what I want sixteen hundred so let's get to it also enter that and jump it up to sixteen hundred next up we haven't played with our exposure compensation let's do that exposure compensation with the plus minus button on the top of the camera and we're going to go two plus two don't worry about making all these changes we're going to clean this up later on and for the spot for the meeting we're going to go to spot metering on this I went to the wrong place myself go into the meeting down at the bottom is spot on hit okay white balance we haven't been changing this let's go change the white balance to flash and that is gonna have the symbol of the lightning bolt are people following along my going too fast am I going too slow it's somebody way ahead of me I think they're doing pretty I think you guys are doing pretty good so far so for focus mode let's change this back to auto I can't get to it it's great out why can't I get to it oh that's right my lens is in manual focus you gotta switch your lens backto auto focus then you can get back into the focus mode where you can then change it to a f a and here's what I want you to change to three d tracking which is in the a f area mode it's down the fourth option at the bottom we're now in three d auto focus mode and let's change the shutter to the quiet mode so that it doesn't make as much noise I can still hear it but it's a little bit quieter all right let's do another test let's change things around again all ready for this test I want you to start off with pee for program that's pretty easy you don't have to worry about shutter speeds raptures let's put your so at two hundred next up let's go to a minus three on the exposure compensation who we were a plus to this means we've got to move a lot in the other direction minus three there we go next up we're going to go to center waited metering we were there once before but we're going find it again we're changing from spot to center weight it and then we're going to change are focusing area excuse me are white balance to shade go back in the white balance the shade he is what looks like a little house with a shadow cast beside it the focus mode is going to go to continuous so go back to the f mode and make sure it's a f c for continuous the a f area mode we're going to go to dynamic which is thie one bracket in the middle with the points to the top the bottom in the side it's the second one down it's called dynamic area a and then finally let's put the self timer on on the drive mode and it would do a ten second self timer and I'm not gonna take the time to do it we're going to do one final test just so that your fingers and your eyes are familiar with where to look so this final one let's go to shutter priority I want to go all the way down to four seconds you may get a warning subject is too bright but that's okay this is just a test I s so it eight hundred make sure exposure compensation is back at zero got it that plus minus button and let's put the meat oring on spot highly centered in the spot and then we're going to take quite balanced to incandescent this is the standard screw in light bulb also known as tungsten bulbs compact fluorescent bulbs also fit in this category focus mode let's go to manual that means back on the lands flip it over to manual write it right on the lands don't worry about the area mode and let's change the drive mode to continuous that's the lever on top okay, now that we have got your camera into a a position in which I think it's probably impossible to take a decent photograph, we need to start resetting it back to the norm standards and what we're going to do this, we're gonna look at some actual picture taking examples, so the first one is just a landscape shot if you want to take away landscape picture and what what's kind of common about landscapes is that you will have something in the foreground, you'll have something in the background. You often have the opportunity to be working from a tripod, and it's often recommended that you work from a tripod doing this sort of thing and there's nothing moving a lot in the photograph, so you're not really concerned about shutter speed, but you're very, very concerned about depth of field, so let's set the camera up for this scenario. Personally, I like setting the camera in manual, so go ahead, set the camera, emmanual, because you're gonna have a few minutes to get the shot in. Most likely the shutter speed will be whatever it needs to be. You're on a tripod, it won't matter, but if we want lots of depth of field, let's set f sixteen and so you have to press and on the plus minus button and go ahead and set f sixteen that gives us good depth of field. Our s o I want to have the best quality images possible, so I'm going to set my eyes so at one hundred, so make sure it gets back down to one hundred. We're not going to need our exposure compensation because we're in manual, so we move on to the meeting mode, let's, change arm eatery mode to matrix, which is a good general purpose mode that I'm going to recommend for most, all the things that we're gonna be looking at for white balance let's, make sure that is back at auto, I'm shooting in raw, so I don't need to worry about it. If you are in jpeg, you might need to set that for daylight or cloudy, or whatever the situation is for focusing. I like to be pretty particular about where I'm going to focus, and so I will choose the single shot it's great out in my camera, because in the last setting, we turn the auto focus off on the lens, so make sure the lenses in auto focus, and then we can go to a f and select the s for single servo auto focus as faras the mode, the area that I would want you to go to, a single point focusing which is the top selection in the a f area mode, and finally the drive mode at single should do just fine so all the way up at the top single and that's a good landscape mode, so moving on to a portrait mode so we talk about shooting a portrait were generally shooting portrait's of people, but we could shoot portrait's of animals what's common here is that you want the subject's face in particular the eyes in focus so that's going to be the area that you're most likely going to focus on? So you need to be very careful about focusing you need to be concerned about subject movement both your subject moving as well as yourself moving so you're going to have to choose a shutter speed that's fast enough that you don't show that movement unless you want that of course, and here because the subjects are likely to be moving around slightly from point to point. Most people don't shoot thes from a tripod they're going to be shooting them handheld, so you have to be careful about having a fast enough shutter speed to hand hold the camera. And so if I'm shooting a portrait of somebody, I'm usually asking them if I can shoot a portrait and they're giving me a couple of minutes, maybe just one minute but sometimes more than that to set up so I'm more than happy to set the camera in manual and get everything exactly as I wanted to I want a reasonably fast shutter speed let's go to one hundred twenty fifth because that would be a good starting point and for an aperture I want to shoot with this shallow depth of field is possible now the lens that I'm using right now doesn't go down to f four, so I'm going to go as wide as I can get on this lands lowest f number possible and that on this lands is three point five, so if you got one point for use it if you don't just do the best you can for the esso like the landscape, I wanted to be a ce high quality as possible, so I'm going to leave it at I s o one hundred for this I'll worry about exposure compensation if I need it for mita ring I'm going to leave it at matrix I will double check to see that I am there I am indeed at matrix so I'm gonna leave that there white balance I'm going to leave it audio auto if you're shooting raw, you don't need to worry about this for focus. This is what's kind of important I would be in the single mode so that you could be very selective so you can lock your focus in on your subject's eyes and I would be in the single point mode which is just below the f s the f area mode single point auto focus this is exactly where we were for landscapes, so this part actually hasn't changed. And finally, on the drive mode, I prefer to have the camera in continuous people's facial expressions and their gestures changed very quickly, and this allows you to kind of shoot through a burst of images when everything is just to your liking. And so that's. How I would set up the camera for a portrait mode. Next up, let's do a blur photo why would we want to take a blurry photo? It's? Nothing worse than a blurry photo, right? There's? Plenty of good blurry photos, there's, good blur and there's bad blur first looking at good blur. So whether it's a waterfall showing the water movement or the dog's running and you haven't blurring their feet, this is how I had set this type of shot up. First off, I like setting it in manual because I like to have direct control over those shutter speeds and apertures, you're going to need a slower shutter speed. This is what's kind of key now what that magic shutter speed is, I don't know, but a fifteenth of a second is a good place to start you may need something a little faster, a little slower, it depends on the movement that you're photographing. The aperture really doesn't matter too much but you're likely to be somewhere in the f eleven range so why don't you go ahead and set that on your cameras for practice for the so it can definitely be at one hundred for most of these situations no reason to bump that up I will check to see that I met one hundred I am indeed so I will leave it there for metering and white balance these air going to remain the same for a lot of these I'll be choosing matrix metering an auto white balance which is where I was set before us I'm not gonna worry about that for focusing I prefer to manual focus on these and so we're going to switch the lens back over to manual focus if it's the waterfall I might do ah live view magnify in I just manual focus on the rocks of the water so that it's perfectly sharp so that I know that I am perfectly sharp on that if it's the dog race that I'm trying to blur I would focus perhaps on the ground where they're going to be running the path that they're going to be running on and then I'm going to be doing a panning motion I'm going to have enough depth of field at f eleven so that focus is in critical but this way I could be sure that the lens isn't inadvertently going to the foreground or background we don't need to worry about thie f area mode and for the drive mode for the waterfall, and I put it in single. But for other types of panning action, I would put it in continuous so that you could get several shots and several opportunities at getting a nice blur shot. All right, so kind of the option. The option, the opposite of the blur shot is the action shot and here's, where you're photographing something, someone, some group of people that are moving towards you away from you and your camera needs to track their focus. So the important things here is a fascinating shutter speed to stop their movement and a focusing system design to lock on and follow their movement. Most action that I have found usually takes place in a predictable area, and so I like using manual focus to figure out the right shutter, speed and aperture and have it set. So for action shots, you're probably gonna need something pretty fast, like a five hundredth of a second. So go ahead and set that on your camera. As for an appetite as faras an aperture goes, you're probably going to need a fairly wide aperture to shoot sports. A lot of sports photographers like lenses that go down to two point eight this lens doesn't go down to two point eight, but I will do the best that I can, which is three point five, which is just ah half stop away. So I'm pretty close for the I s so this is where you may need to bump this up a little bit higher and in this case you might want to bump it up from one hundred to four hundred you may need to go beyond this you may not need to go to four hundred kind of various, but this is a good starting point for shooting action. Our meeting will be at matrix are white balance will be at auto that's the same. The focus is really important here. This is where we need to change to continuous once again it's great out on my camera because my lenses in manual focus from our last little setup. So I switched my lens back to auto focus and I go into the focus mode and change it to a f c for continuous we can now see that the continuous it's set now this is where we also want to make some changes in the area where we are focusing and so we're going to go in here and we're going to change to the dynamic area. This is my favorite for sports motion you get to choose the starting point, the bracket, he could be left top, right bottom middle, and then it will follow that movement through the nearby brackets, so let's set the dynamic area focus and finally for the drive mode, of course, we're going to set this to the continuous mode, which is actually where it has been for the last setting s so that I could shoot a series of shots burst of shots very quickly. All right, here is one more setting this is called maximum sharpness, and this is where there's no great need for depth of field there's no great need for a particular shutter speed to stop in emotion, but you just want to get the sharpest possible sharpest picture possible. You're going to want to work from a tripod on this case, you'll have time to work so I would set it up in the manual mode. The shutter speed doesn't matter because you're on a tripod camera movement, subject movement, non existence you don't need to worry about it. Ah, good aperture is an aperture in the middle of your rage, and so f eleven is going to be a good aperture to shoot at for a lot of people because it's kind of in the middle of the range depends a little bit on which lends you have s o will be at one hundred gonna get that changed back down there from our sports mode from four hundred back down to one hundred and then from eatery and we're going to keep that at matrix for white balance will keep that at auto focusing mode single point but you want to be very precise about what you are focusing on so a f s for single f area this is where you want to go back to single point focusing so that you have one pinpoint area you can decide where you want it focus and for the drive mode this is where I'd recommend using the self timer you could set the two second if you want or you could just do the ten seconds either way that way your hands are not on the camera when you're actually firing the shutter so now that we've got your camera all mixed up in these different modes let's just get it reset back too basic photography and so if I'm throwing the camera over my shoulder I'm going to be walking around the streets and I don't know what I'm going to be photographing here's what I would do to set my camera yes I'm actually going to a somewhat automatic mode here aperture priority let the camera figure out a few things for me I'm just going to do aperture priority and for an aperture, I'm going to start reasonably wide open. So on this in this case, I'm going to start it f four and if I need more depth of field, I'll make that change at that time. But for now I have a reasonably fast shutter speed to start with. I'm going to want to leave my eyes so at one hundred let me double check that I am there I am indeed at s o one hundred, I will bump that up when and where necessary matrix for metering an auto for white balance that hasn't changed for focus points for just general purpose. I like the single point so that I can focus on one thing and it locks in and then I can recompose if necessary, I will change it to continuous. When I go to moving action, I will use the spot area in the middle and so the single point focus and for the dr, modi will generally just leave it in the single mode. And so there you are, ready to go out and start snapping away so that's the section called camera operation. And hopefully by now you have a really good feel for where all the important controls are on the camera and the type of changes that you're likely to make out in the field and seems like anytime you come across a new situation there's usually two or three things that you're going to have to change to set the camera up to get the best picture possible from that sending so we're going to see if there's any questions or comments about that section before we end it with our lenses and accessories john does the d thirty one hundred have uh exposure bracketing d thirty one hundred does not have exposure bracketing so that is something that you would have to do manually and you could do very easy you could set your camera up in program take one picture and then do a plus one and then a minus one using the exposure, compensation and kind of building on that paula in ohio head said does nikon use different term for high dynamic range? I thought my camera had it but not finding where to set it she has a dean five thousand so maybe you could explain that again yeah here I don't know the d five thousand inside and out so there may be some different things but h d r stands for high dynamic range and it's a technique where photographers take multiple pictures at various exposure levels bright middle dark sometimes five, seven, nine pictures and they combine them into one picture. That is not something that this camera or the five thousand does on its own. In there, the active delighting is kind of doing some of that it's trying to hold back certain highlight information and lighten up the shadows. But I certainly when it say it's enough to throw it into hdr photography, that would be something that you need to do a little bit more manually and then manipulate in a program like photo matics. I believe great thanks. Um handle, I'd ask what's the limitations on this camera with wireless flash wireless flash. It really doesn't have any capabilities as faras working. Nikon has a very sophisticated wireless flash system, where some cameras will tell other flashes how much power to put out and can communicate with multiple flashes in multiple groups working together or individually on a very sophisticated system. And this camera does not have that commander capability it's rather limited to what can be done through the tt l flash. There are some external accessories available from companies like pocket wizard, but not something I want to get into it this point, okay, thank you question from sparks was here, she said, maybe for later, but do you find the gps feature on this camera useful at all? I haven't had a chance to put the gps feature to use in the field I like the concept of it but I haven't had a chance to use it yet I be nathan had said that is the fact that this camera is lacking a port for mike that important and uh would it be very difficult to shoot audio with another mike and then sync audio with video just yeah time right well this does have a built in microphone it's not great if you just want simple little video it's fine. One of the things this lacks is it is it doesn't have a mic and put on it and so if you wanted to shoot this to film your next hollywood production if that's the case here's here's what you need to do you can record the video with this but then I would buy an external device for recording audio and then you would probably want some sort of sinking device so that you could sink this stuff up later in aa in whatever program you're using to assemble it later and so it's ah it's a bit different old work with either you keep it very simple or it gets very complicated very easily higher and cameras will have ports that you can plug in stereo microphones for and another question from my beneath in uh does the infrared remote control work with the g thirty one hundred I will be covering that in the lenses and accessories applied for that there's a slide for that ah, bohr had asked for for blurring images, why not spot me blood spot metering? Spot metering is a tool that could be used for any of the modes it is just a personal style option, you might say it could be used. The problem with the running dog is that it's a little hard to keep track of where that spot is reading at that very moment that you're firing the shutter, the spot metering is a tool that you need to be very, very careful with it's, a very powerful tool, something you don't want to accidentally leave on in your camera because it measures such a small area if you have it thrown onto an especially light or especially dark area, it'll throw off your exposures tremendously and so for beginners, I would say, uh, to kind of tend not to worry about spot metering, I would look mohr at taking an image that you have taken and wow, this is a terrible image, but I'm going to use it anyway on dh looking at the history ram and if you don't know about a history ram there's, a great class called phone fundamentals and digital photography, I recommend you look at it from creative live because I go through a full explanation and I don't use a spot meter anymore because I have a history, graham to show me my results and I don't need the spot meter, okay? There was another clarification question from crushed my main subject is my infant, who moves a lot, what I use focus mode, fc continuous, if the kids are moving a lot, the continuous smote would be good and the question that I don't know that they didn't ask is, let me let me go ahead and set this up on the cameras so I'm going to go in and I'm going to change to a f see mode for continuous and then on what area I'm going to choose dynamic might work pretty well auto area might work pretty well and three d might work pretty well the it depends on the style of movement, the age and the way they're running and forward. I have not had a great chance to really experiment with the three d mode it's a new mode where it's using additional information besides contrast, it's also using color and lew minutes and that may be a very good mood mode for an erratic, moving infant as they can be. Sometimes I have another question, and I know we talk about this a lot with the white balance, but someone had asked why you wouldn't adjust. White balance in the computer with computer software is it better to adjust in camera and does it work on raw? Also right, it's, it's, it's a complicated issue and it's frustrating and that's why I should rot if you shoot raw, you get the original data information and you can adjust things later on in the computer with no damaging effect to the final picture. When you are shooting j pegs and you have selected oh let's, just go and choose incandescent light your camera is collecting all the data information, and then it says this picture needs to be tweaked in color to accommodate for incandescent light and then it's all processed and compressed using that information. If you then realize that you had made a mistake, you shot j peg, you put it in incandescent, you went outside and you took a picture it's going to be the wrong process information for that image and it's not going to look right and you're going to go into photo shop and you're going to start playing with the color sliders and you're gonna find that you can't quite get it right. And even if you do get it pretty close while you're doing this, you're damaging the photo ref, which is something photographers don't like doing damaging their photographs and so that's why you either need to shoot raw or you need to set it right before you shoot it, and so my preference is to shoot raw, leave it in auto and worry about it later if it doesn't happen to be right, because the auto works pretty good. And so even if you are shooting j peg and it is in auto, chances are most of the time it's going to be right. But this is a good reason to keep look at the images that you're getting on the back of the monitor, and if there is a major problem, go into the white balance and make that change. Um, aren't we wanted to know what the color grit is that has given in white balance the color grid something we're we're gonna kind of short change you in here. We're not going into every detail, but there is a way to kind of customize the white balance. If you find that the incandescent setting isn't quite to this incandescent lights that you have in your house, you could adjust that a little bit and so take a look in the instruction manual to find out more information about that.