just have to vent...

[SnapsbyPoteat]

I'm a newbie trying hard to learn how to take good pictures. but everything I take seems out of focus, overexposed or underexposed, and it's frustrating. I've been on this forum for a couple of months trying to take in every bit of advice and tips that I can but I'm still having problems. I'm also trying to read many books such as the joy of digital photography, understanding exposure and the magic lantern xti guide.
I went to the zoo last weekend hoping to take some great shots and experienced the same problems, over or underexposed for almost everypicture. I learned afterwards that I think it was a metering problem. Plus I realized how much I need a telephoto lens to actually get good zoo pictures.

I guess I'm realizing that theres a lot more to good pictures than what I had origianall y thought.
some may just need some PP in photoshop (I have elements 5) but I am still learning a lot about that and the 'auto' functions don't seem to work.


I've also realized how quick you have to be for setting everything becaus a good shoot can come and go so quickly and one wrong setting can ruin the whole exposure.

i will be uploading some of the pics to my blogspot later on so please check that out and let me know what you think and any advice.

I'm looking for a local digital photography class to enroll in but so far haven't found anything. I'm really a hands on learner and I think having someone go over camera settings with me in person would help me out a lot more than reading a book and making mistake after mistake.

i guess i just need some reassurance that it'll get better,
thanks for reading

[Photodawg1]

I started out like that. You see great work and you so want yours to look better! I have been shooting for about 5 years now, and I still don't know exposure and a million other things like I should. But I get better each time I shoot. Sometimes you have to balance perfection with the enjoyment of just shooting...and when that enjoyment comes through it brings an element that the most technically perfect photo can't touch. When I went digital, I went out and shot nature for a year...because I love it and more importantly no huge pressure...well except for the kingfisher and red wing black birds that howled with laughter over my attempts to even come a mile to what Gary Fairchild can do. The point is...breathe. Find something you love taking shots of and relax and shoot and don't go crazy if they are not spot on every time. That will come...(well I am hoping!). Strive for the ideal to the limits of your bliss...Uh-oh I know I am going to get flamed for this post! You will get good advice from others here more knowledgeable.

[rw2]

If you stick with it you will get better. This forum is a great place to learn. Post pictures and ask questions. I have leaned a mountain of information here and have
100x as much left to learn. You may also want to turn image editing OK on. That way if there is some PP that can be done to help, people will be able to do that.
Realize the limitations of your gear. You have what you need to learn but you would not want to take pics of something that would require a telephoto lens.
One note of caution the more you learn the more it can cost, glass is expensive. Good luck.

[HaroldC3]

Coming from a PnS just 4 months ago I know what you are going through. You may want to try and get the Magic Latern dvd, it has some good info for the XTi.

http://www.amazon.com/DVD-Magic-Lantern-Digital-Cameras/dp/1600591000/ref=pd_bbs_sr_3/102-3179390-2675368?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1191624037&sr=8-3

The whole experience can be overwhelming. You just have to take small steps. Work on one thing at a time (Metering, DOF, etc).

[gabrioladude]

it is a matter of practice

try to develope a routine:

remember S C D E

S= settings

have I reset my settings from the last shot, do I really want to be in shutter priority or should I be in Aperture priority, is the ISO too high?

C= Compose

decide how you want to frame the picture, make sure there are no distractions, have you simplified the image, am I getting the best angle. Where are the leading lines in the shot. Do I have a sense of balance in the scene. Should I respect the rule of thirds. If my center of interest is too central will that make the scene too static...

D=depth of field

what depth of field do I want, do I want the background in focus or out of focus, this influences your aperture setting...

E= exposure

so what exposure do I need here. Will the meter in fact meter the scene properly. is the scene on average 18% grey or do I need to adjust the exposure. Should I compensate up or down.

it takes time....

enjoy the process...

[::John::]

I started out like that. You see great work and you so want yours to look better! I have been shooting for about 5 years now, and I still don't know exposure and a million other things like I should. But I get better each time I shoot. Sometimes you have to balance perfection with the enjoyment of just shooting...and when that enjoyment comes through it brings an element that the most technically perfect photo can't touch. When I went digital, I went out and shot nature for a year...because I love it and more importantly no huge pressure...well except for the kingfisher and red wing black birds that howled with laughter over my attempts to even come a mile to what Gary Fairchild can do. The point is...breathe. Find something you love taking shots of and relax and shoot and don't go crazy if they are not spot on every time. That will come...(well I am hoping!). Strive for the ideal to the limits of your bliss...Uh-oh I know I am going to get flamed for this post! You will get good advice from others here more knowledgeable.

Well, there should be no need for any flaming. You have described a LOT of us very adequately.

To the OP: the only pressure on you is the pressure you allow to be on you. Relax. Enjoy the fact that you CAN just go out and shoot. Practise with the camera - look at the shots - decide what looks good and what looks bad - analyse them to see if you can work out why they looked good or bad.

We all went through that phase - and some of us are still doing that :oops:

But really - I am content with the pace - on a nature shoot I get to see the landscapes around me - that beats sitting in front of a computer refreshing the POTN screen.

At the zoo - I get to sit and watch and wait - the pose I want will come - maybe not this trip - maybe the next - anticipation.

The thing is - if this is a hobby to you - there is more to the hobby than just taking pictures. You get to go places, see things, experience things. How much better is that than just sitting watching TV?

And, along the way, you are learning how to encapsulate that experience.

And the bottom line? You only have to please yourself - all the armchair critics in the world shouldn't make a damn to you - as long as you feel you are learning and advancing... go for it. Just enjoy the experience.

Edit: and, remember - we can be our own worst critics ;)

[dale65bama]

Ahhhh, the problems of having instant access to the images! When I started with my first 35mm camera, the only ways I could see the pictures I took the same day were to wait for the b/w film to be processed at the photo store (it was 25 miles from my home) or process them myself. If they were slides, it would take 3-6 days because everything was sent by mail to some central processing lab.

If you are really frustrated with your progress, put the camera away for a week, then work on one thing - focus, DOF, exposure, and so on. If you want to work on composition, you might use the green box and only think about how you are going to organize your view of the subject.

Relax. Don't obsess about it. Have fun.

Dale

[number six]

I've also realized how quick you have to be for setting everything becaus a good shoot can come and go so quickly and one wrong setting can ruin the whole exposure.

Breathless, are you by any chance shooting in manual mode? Sorta sounds like it, with all the settings you need to set quickly.

If that's true, try P or Av mode. They can take every bit as good a shot as manual. In P, if you don't care for the camera's chosen aperture or shutter speed you can adjust the program shift control to get settings you like.

Another thing: are you using a high enough ISO? A good setting for general pics is 400 (I use 800 most of the time). A higher ISO will give you much more flexibility with the combination of aperture and shutter speed.

Before the "M zealots" get their knickers in a twist, let me state that there certainly are situations where M is best, sometimes not just best but necessary.

Hope some of these thoughts are helpful to you...

-js

[rw2]

I agree start in P mode so you can see what your camera can do and it takes the pressure off of you when shooting. As you gain experince you can switch to the other modes. Also as you get better you will want to shoot in RAW so so can do more in PP. No matter what level we are at we all strive to get better.

[segasaturn]

Use the green box mode!!! Yeah, some people will tell you that you should have just gotten a P&S. However, learning with the green box mode has many learning opportunities.

1. You'll still need to focus properly.
2. You'll still need be aware of exposure (if you recompose).
3. You'll still need to work on composition.
4. You'll still need to place yourself properly and hold your camera with minimal shake.

5. You'll probably GET more of the shots you want. And then, you look at the EXIF data afterwards. See what your camera uses for ISO, shutter speed, and aperture to get the shot.

For me, there's no point is saying, "I'm going to learn in M mode. Even though I only get 5% keepers, I'll learn much more this way than in green box mode." I think you'll get more frustrated, get fewer keepers, and waste your time. No one is going to go up to you at the zoo and check out your settings on your camera.

[Photodawg1]

Shoot! I totally forgot I started in "training-wheels"green mode for a couple of months! Otherwise I probably wouldn't be shooting now!

[LBaldwin]

Dear Breathless,

Sorry but those feelings of frustrations are not likely to go away. The key here is actually quite simple. A notebook. For eons and millinia <vbg> field photographers and many commercial shooters take copious notes re: their subject. Starting as follows
1. Location and time of day
2. Scene or subject
3. Camera used lens and focal length info.
4. Goal of the image.
5. Frame or shot number / file number
6. Shutter speed and aperture settings
7. ISO settinngs
8. filters used.
9. Metering info
10. lighting info.

Alot of this can be gotten from the EXIF data. BUT if you write it down, it will slow you down and force you to SEE the image prior to pushing the shutter. Learn exposure and focus first, then start on comp, then on lighting and so forth. This takes a few minutes to purchase and a lifetime to master. It is good that you are not happy. If you are perfectly content with your images then it is time to hang up the camera...

You got some good advice so far, I hope this helps too.

Les

[Mark_Cohran]

Well, I've been shooting for almost 30 years now, and nearly 10 years with digital. As others have said, it takes practice. That said, even the best photographers can have some bad days where nothing seem to go right - but you get fewer and fewer of those as you get more familiar and comfortable with your equipment. Don't forget, you took up photography to have fun, so don't get too frustrated.

Mark

[Samdiver74]

Also a good rule of thumb I learned back with film, out of a 24 exposure you may get 1-5 keepers, at least with digital if it didn't work out delete the image, I would definitely shoot RAW and Jpeg to start as you can keep the RAWs for a later date so when your getting better and familiar with RAW you can come back to the image and Post process it.
You'll be surprised
One thing you can't correct in Photoshop is a badly out of focus shot.

Make sure you Learn how to read your Histogram (Left = Dark (4 letters)) (Right is Light (5 letters)) This is a very important tool and will help you greatly if you can understand it properly.

[dmstraton]

I can't add anything others haven't already said except that learning the different metering modes and learning how to use the exposure lock feature changed my photography a lot. You start goofing with that and you will start to learn how the meter thinks a little better. A lot of my biggest exposure issues went away after that - I still screw up (a lot), but a little chimping goes a long way.

Another thing was picking the right time to shoot, when doing nature. If you are in a constantly cloudy environment get ready for every shot to have blown skies or dark shadows compensating for it - that's a no win due to dynamic range - pick new subjects at that point.

Also, based on your blog I would learn to use fill-flash. You put people under a tree with the light shining through, your meter will expose for the bright light and you'll get dark subjects. Meter on the subjects, you'll get blown sky...use a flash to fill in and that issue will disappear...watch that you aren't unintentionally creating silhouettes.

[JackProton]

Try the different auto-exposure modes of your camera and see which one works best for you. They can make a huge difference. I usually leave my XTi on Partial Metering.

One of the more surpirsing things I learned about auto-exposure some time ago was that its fairly simple-minded. Auto-exposure actually tries to set the exposure as if the overall brightness in every scene is 18% gray. Shooting a white flower? A black cat? A group of people in light clothing? Your autoexposure will try to turn them gray. If you can keep this in mind, you can usually make auto-exposure do the right thing when you add light to white (and remove light from black) to get a better exposure the first time.

[SnapsbyPoteat]

thank you everyone for your encouragement and advice, I do have a lot to learn and I guess I expected to be able to read a couple books and understand the basics of DSLR... which I now know may take years.

here is my photos from the zoo you can look at the EXIF data and let me know if you have any suggestions thanks

http://s217.photobucket.com/albums/cc203/poteat_3177/

I'm glad I found this forum, it has really helped out a lot.

[jsfpa]

Check this out.

http://www.ppsop.com/index.aspx

[SnapsbyPoteat]

wow those courses look great, thanks for the website.

$395 for the first understanding exposure class, whoa. This hobby really is expensive.
something else to add to my 'wishlist' that is already a couple thousand g's strong :)

[SkipD]

thank you everyone for your encouragement and advice, I do have a lot to learn and I guess I expected to be able to read a couple books and understand the basics of DSLR... which I now know may take years.

here is my photos from the zoo you can look at the EXIF data and let me know if you have any suggestions thanks

http://s217.photobucket.com/albums/cc203/poteat_3177/

I'm glad I found this forum, it has really helped out a lot.My suggestion for learning the basics: Turn all of the camera's automation off - use the "M" mode only for the initial learning process. Obtain a decent handheld light meter (such as the Sekonic L-358 ) and use it instead of the camera's meter.

The handheld light meter will allow you to analyse a scene's lighting in a way that is much more informative than the camera's meter. You can take a single reading and then flip through various shutter speed, aperture, and even ISO combinations in a heartbeat. You can then choose the combination of the three settings that makes the most sense and dial it into the camera.

You really need to learn when and why to use the various settings. I looked at a few of your shots and it seems that some of the settings were just random. For example - the overexposed shot of the giraffe in front of the wall used a MUCH higher ISO setting than some of the interior shots. You could have easily used ISO 100 for the giraffe shot instead of ISO 1600 and probably gotten a much better image. Several of the shots I looked at where you were using Tv mode (shutter priority) had a -1.33 exposure compensation dialed in. That much compensation is rarely needed for ordinary scenes.

An additional thing you could do is to use the "P" mode and then study the EXIF data to see what the camera thought it should do for exposure settings. While the camera cannot always make the best choice, you may learn from its choices of settings.

Getting control of the exposure basics is really one of the highest priorities in learning to take good photographs that are under YOUR control and not the camera's. I feel really strongly that the handheld meter and manual settings are the way to go. When I started in photography, there were no automated cameras. Learning the basics was extremely simple because there was no automation to muddy up the water, so to speak.

When I got my first DSLR, I found the automation quite confusing at first - even though I had a VERY solid background in the basics. I only can imagine how the automation confuses the new photographer who is trying to grasp the basics for the first time.

[jsfpa]

wow those courses look great, thanks for the website.

$395 for the first understanding exposure class, whoa. This hobby really is expensive.
something else to add to my 'wishlist' that is already a couple thousand g's strong :)

That class is run by the same guy who wrote your Understanding Exposer Book.

[SnapsbyPoteat]

That class is run by the same guy who wrote your Understanding Exposer Book.


yeah i got that... I bet it's an awesome class, I've loved his book so far. I would love to be able to take a class by him.

[SnapsbyPoteat]

great Ideas skipd! I thought others had told me to stay away from p mode because the pictures don't always turn out right, (but I'm having that problem anyways).

The giraffe picture was defantly an oops I think I changed the ISO after that one and had some other pictures but they came out too dark looking (i think i put two girafee pics on there)

[Samdiver74]

On another note, your Compositional eye needs to be dialed in.
When at the zoo try and take man made objects out of your scenes.
like fences etc.
Example was the Flamingo shot with the Fence in the bottom section of the image and the Cheetah shot, move to a different position, Don't Center your subject.

the shot with the chimp is over exposed, you could have metered off the grass to the left side of the chimp to get close to the correct exposure.
Also there is that wall he is standing on, that has to be close to neutral grey, if you have a spot meter you could try and get a reading off of that, But the clump of grass to his left would be better.
The Histogram and LCD is your best friend in this learning process.
you can take a picture, look at the preview on the LCD and then go to Histogram and see where your graph is.
Then you can dial in the exposure for the next shot.
Don't Center your Subject.
Here is a quick adjustment I made to your shot.
Hope you don't mind. if you do I'll remove it.
Cropped, Curves adjustment, Highlight Shadow adjustment.
As you can see from the image you have motion blur on the head of the Chimp, Burst mode comes in handy for action shots, out of 5 shots there maybe one really exceptional shot.
But as you can see with this shot I probably, I personally wouldn't have kept it purely because of the Blur.
Again always look at your LCD and preview the image.
if the shot is blurred then delete it while your still at the location and try again, that is the great thing about digital.
http://img514.imageshack.us/img514/6471/img1230compositionalexehh5.jpg

The shot where your Son is standing in front of the Cheetah and Meerkats exhibit sign, I would have had him stand to the left or right of the meerkats wording, as his height would fit perfect in in that space.
Also see about getting a hood for your lens or shoot at a different part of the day, you have a lens flare in that shot also.
DON'T CENTER YOUR SUBJECTS IN THE CENTER OF YOUR FRAME.

try and avoid the harsh sunlight at midday this will mess with you exposure, with extremely bright highlights and dark cast shadows.
If you have to shoot at this time of the day, watch for backlighting try and emphasize the color of the animal, (ie your Komodo Dragon shot) the highlights are burnt out / too hot and there is a Halo of light around the Reptile, Flash would be the ultimate to bring the details out but I'm guessing this guy is behind glass.
Flash would just reflect off glass so in this case he would have been better off shot during the morning.
Metering on a brighter source of light will help, Personally I would have metered on part of the rocks to the right and then bracket the shot.
Also moving position to the right might have helped.
Your area of focus in this shot is the Reptiles shoulders and legs.
Always aim for sharp focus on the eye/s
Rotating the camera to portrait orientation would have probably been better for this shot.
this shot is Center Framed DON"T DO IT.
the dragons head is looking to the left, when framing the shot always think what is he looking at, Move the camera a little to the left also.
This results in the Dragons head being moved to the right of the frame and giving the creature space to look into frame. Helps balance the image.
This probably would have helped with your Cameras exposure also.

However this is where 'M' mode comes in
I usually check the area for different meter readings and try and get an average, I then adjust my Shutter speed and Aperture now my exposure is locked at what I want.
I then move the camera to focus on the eye of the creature and then hold the shutter button down half way to lock focus, IGNORE what the camera is telling you in the viewfinder for the exposure information, now still holding your shutter button halfway recompose your shot and then press shutter all the way, now look at your image on the LCD and check you Histogram

always remember if the animal or persons head is looking left, you move the camera to left and vise versa

With the Giraffe shot holding the camera in portrait mode would have been better, to emphasize it's height, however that shot is over exposed and looks like a general shot that everyone else takes.
Remember with a DSLR you're not everyone, with a DSLR you have various functions you can use to control the picture you want and not what the camera thinks you want.
Always think, how can I bring out the best in this confined space.

There are a lot of man made objects in the shot, the fence to the right, the little fence to the left and the footpath.

There are times when you can't remove these elements, but with a descent Zoom lens you can or change to a better position.
If the animals aren't co-operating no big loss try later or try another day.
but never be afraid to use the LCD and histogram features.

Hope this hasn't confused you too much.

[MDJAK]

Perhaps you should consider botany as a hobby. I don't know what the heck it is, but I hear it's a lot easier. ;)

Just stick with it and us, you newbie, you'll be snapping great shots in no time. ;)

me

[Lowner]

"Also a good rule of thumb I learned back with film, out of a 24 exposure you may get 1-5 keepers"

I'd say thats a pretty good average. Mine with film is still one in 36 if I'm lucky. I read somewhere that Ansel Adams once said that he was happy to get I good image a year. Mind you, we are not all blessed with that sort of patience or dedication to perfection.

We are all struggling with the same problem as the OP. Yes, some are further up the road than others, some might even decide to turn off the road early in frustration. But if it was easy, I for one would have got bored with it long before now. So hang on in there, keep shooting and asking questions.

Richard

[SeattleSpeedster]

yeah thats about my keeper rate too....sometimes i never know which ones are going to be good.

Dont get frustrated, and dont think that your credit card and a couple of clicks on BH's website is the answer. Learn with what you have and it will make your new lenses etc much more meaningful. You might also consider grabbing or perusing a canon dslr how to book or two at barnes/noble or amazon. I also like to study others photos and their exif and see how they did what they did.

[JackProton]

Two quick recommendations - a circualr polarizer and using Exposure Lock.

[gorby]

Aperture: f/36.0?

http://s217.photobucket.com/albums/cc203/poteat_3177/?action=view&current=IMG_1688.jpg

[ryant35]

You are using shutter priority and a shutter speed way too slow. Switch to aperture priority, use your largest aperture value (smallest number), lower your iso to 100 or 200, & and of course telephoto lens makes all the difference. When shutter priority forces your camera to use f/36, there is no chance of focusing past a fence. You are also using custom white balance, I would switch to auto for now, you've got too many settings to think about to worry about white balance.


Here is the difference practice, a telephoto lens, and the right settings make
Aperture priority, f/5.6, iso 200, 1/125sec.
http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k173/ryant35/IMG_1582-1-1.jpg

[PhotosGuy]

I've also realized how quick you have to be for setting everything becaus a good shoot can come and go so quickly and one wrong setting can ruin the whole exposure. A big part of shooting is anticipation. At the zoo, you see a buzzard flying 100 yards away. You should already have the cam set for average outdoor shots, but maybe you decide you'd need more exposure to get detail in it's wings IF it comes near you. So when do you modify your settings, now, or later when it's just above you? ;)
Some more basic advice: Newbie needing advice (http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=388899)

[SnapsbyPoteat]

A lot of you are talking about exposure lock which I knew nothing about going to the zoo - now I really wish I did! I have tried using this method a few times with other pictures and they have come out much better, so thank you for your advice about this and I wish I knew about this last weekend!!

I also realized that at times I was messing with different settings for my camera and would forget to change them, which ruined some shots (like the manual white balance, f/36 etc. exposure compensation ) sometimes I like to take pictures of weird settings just for a visual image of how it does or does not turn out. but I now realize that I need to pay more attention to those.


thank you for all your advice - pointing this stuff out to me (especially my mistakes) is what will help me in the long run. I tend to be a perfectionist when it comes to something I'm passionate about so making mistakes is something I want to learn how not to do ( yeah yeah -- i realize it will always happen)

[SnapsbyPoteat]

Aperture: f/36.0?

http://s217.photobucket.com/albums/cc203/poteat_3177/?action=view&current=IMG_1688.jpg


i read in understanding exposure that for a storytelling picture you do a larger aperture . I was practicing that -- I realize the scene isn't the best, but it was an attempt.

[SnapsbyPoteat]

You should already have the cam set for average outdoor shots,


what would you suggest to be the best setting sfor average outdoor suny day shots

[gorby]

i read in understanding exposure that for a storytelling picture you do a larger aperture . I was practicing that -- I realize the scene isn't the best, but it was an attempt.

I think that f36 is simply too small.... most people say lenses start diffracting at around f16 and up...... not to mention it pushes your shutter speed way low (too low for that photo).

But hey, you gave it a shot, there's no harm in that!

[number six]

what would you suggest to be the best setting sfor average outdoor suny day shots

The "sunny 16" rule says a good exposure is 1/ISO at f/16.

That is, in full sunlight using ISO 100, you would shoot at 1/100 at f/16. Better, though, would be 1/400 at f/8. Better yet, IMO, would be ISO 200, 1/800 at f/8.

Good depth of field, high enough shutter speed to eliminate camera shake, ISO low enough that noise will be minimal.

If you want shallow depth of field, perhaps for a portrait, you can open the aperture to f/4 (in Av mode) and let the camera adjust the shutter speed to 1/3200 or something like that.

I like to leave my camera in Av at f/8 for general shots. I also shoot most of my landscapes at ISO 800, but that makes many people shudder. :lol:

-js

[SkipD]

i read in understanding exposure that for a storytelling picture you do a larger aperture . I was practicing that -- I realize the scene isn't the best, but it was an attempt.Actually, a "larger aperture" (literally a larger hole) means a smaller f-stop number (ignoring the fact that the number is actually the denominator of a fraction).

One needs to get the terms correct to be understood in conversation properly, so I thought I'd insert this.

[Samdiver74]

I agree on the White balance also
You basically don't need to worry about it, this is why.
When your shooting RAW you can adjust the white balance in Adobe Camera RAW or Raw shooter essentials or Lightroom.

You will have an eye dropper tool and you basically select what you know as white or a neutral color.
So imagine having 500 pics and each one you messed with the white balance in camera and say 100 came what you expected, to sort through the 400 where they are off on everyone by a different amount takes a while.
(This is why you should select RAW + Hi Res Jpeg in one of the creative modes, as later your gonna have so much more freedom and a higher keeper rate.

So images you thought were trash due to under/over exposure, bad white balance setting etc can be some what salvaged when you know a little bit more about what you're doing and have a work flow set-up).

Further corrections/tweaks can be done in Curves.

Levels (described as a hatchet) will get you within the ballpark

Curves (Described as a surgeons scalpel) Will have you picking you seat with fine detail.
Curves is an Awesome tool, one to definitely know like the back of your hand.
Say out of that 400 images you have 20 of the Giraffe all under the same light of course, you can correct that one picture with all the exposure corrections, white balance, Clarity, Sharpness Saturation etc.
Now with that one picture you can copy the correction info for that one and paste it to the rest of the 19 as they will be shot under the same light. Now you have 20 keeper images and it was done in less than an hour and a half (if you work for 5 mins on each picture would equal 100 mins)

Then you can sort through those 20 images to which you think are the outstanding images, I'm willing to bet there will be 1-5 great images.

in 10-15 mins you'll have 5 pics worked on and ready to post, Print etc what ever you want to do.
RAW may seem like an extra pain in the ass step now but later it will save you so much time.

[Oneslowz28]

I recomend you buy or check out the book Understanding Exposure by Brian Peterson. That book should be part of every photogs collection. Its only 16 bucks on amazon so pick it up and read it. It will help you out alot.

[SnapsbyPoteat]

I recomend you buy or check out the book Understanding Exposure by Brian Peterson. That book should be part of every photogs collection. Its only 16 bucks on amazon so pick it up and read it. It will help you out alot.


as I mentioned in at least 2 post I have started reading this book and my problem is that I'm more of a hands on learner than a read it and understand learner

for example: I just graduated from nursing school and all throughout I hated lectures and had a hard time learning specifics of diseases/medications etc but during clinicals when I would actually see patients with certain diseases and their medication effects it would better click in my mind the understanding of it all. and that's what made me enjoy it.

but i'm still halfway through the book so we'll see how things click more when I'm done.

[PhotosGuy]

what would you suggest to be the best setting sfor average outdoor suny day shots What -js said above. More: For a polar bear or a black bear? Just walking around I'd probably have the cam on 1/200 f/11 ISO 100. But I'd expect to modify it for a dark subject. Or one I wanted to isolate from a background.
A starting point In any light: Need an exposure crutch? (http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=89123)