I must be doing something wrong(canon PS A1100)

[Bandini1]

I must be doing something wrong because i can't take a decent picture with this camera.

Some of the pics are blurry, some just have no detail to them.

I was taking much better pics with my old 3 megapixel camera than i am with this baby.

when i focus on what im taking a photo of...the view finder goes back and forth from being in focus to blurry. Those wee boxes pop up and disappear (sorry for not being more technical)

i know it's me and not the camera.

[Jon]

Example shots?

[teamB_macro]

What kind of lens are you using? Can you post some of the photos you've taken?

[Bandini1]

What kind of lens are you using? Can you post some of the photos you've taken?

here are a couple examples. i had to compress the pics to upload them

anyway...the camera does something i have never had another camera do. when im about to take a photo and looking through the screen it goes in and out of focus like it doesn't know what its supposed to focus on (the little boxes flick on and off)

[Jon]

How far away from the food were you? Looks like you might have been too close. In Normal focusing, the A1100 has to be about 19-20 in. from the subject if you want it to be able to focus. In Macro you can be between 2" and a foot, depending on the focal length you're at.

[Bandini1]

How far away from the food were you? Looks like you might have been too close. In Normal focusing, the A1100 has to be about 19-20 in. from the subject if you want it to be able to focus. In Macro you can be between 2" and a foot, depending on the focal length you're at.

I was at least 20' . I tried the camera again tonight from about 25' . Same horrible results.

maybe i have the settings wrong?

[Jon]

20 and 25 feet (') or inches (")? I assume you meant inches; if you meant feet, that would be a horrendous crop or a Guinness record plate. The second one, I see was at 1/8 sec. That's too slow to hand-hold; either use flash or a tripod in those conditions. And if you meant inches, the first one was right at the margins of the camera's ability to focus; it could have missed focus. Check out the camera's "macro" mode.

[Bandini1]

20 and 25 feet (') or inches (")? I assume you meant inches; if you meant feet, that would be a horrendous crop or a Guinness record plate. The second one, I see was at 1/8 sec. That's too slow to hand-hold; either use flash or a tripod in those conditions. And if you meant inches, the first one was right at the margins of the camera's ability to focus; it could have missed focus. Check out the camera's "macro" mode.

yeah inches sorry

i've taken 50 or so photos and not one has been a decent photo. I have a canon powershot a410 3.2 megapixels that takes way better photos than this camera and i don't do anything differently when taking the photos.

[Jon]

Well, the A410 focuses closer by an inch or two in normal mode than the A1100, so that's probably part of it. So you will have to do some things differently. Just because the cameras aren't identical. And you'll need to watch your shutter speeds; you can't hold a camera steady at 1/8 sec., even with IS, unless you've got muscles of steel.