'Real' Point To "Program" (P) Mode

Can someone give me the 'real explenation or point to using program mode. I know what the definition is, I read it in the manual, but besides that...why do you use it, further meaning?

beats me.
The program guesses what aperature and shutter speed you need. I usually find it not the settings I have in mind. I usually leave mine in Av.

It's just a "nicer" auto mode. You can still change potentially crucial settings, like ISO, FEC, etc. For when you want auto, but you still want some control. In auto, all of the settings are "grayed out".

"P" is underrated in my opinion, it's an auto mode but with the possibility of adjusting the program point (shifting either shutter speed or aperture to where you want it) and adjusting exposure compensation. It's sort of Av and Tv both available to you at the same time. I may most of the time shoot in Av or M but when I'm done for the day I reset my cameras to P, ISO 400, AWB, so that they are ready for a quick grab shot that will have some kind of working setting in case something comes up quickly. For photography where your subjects and types of photography may change all the time (like taking a walk in the city) I often set the camera to P. I don't rate one mode higher than the other, they are all just different ways of arriving at the same exposure setting really.

As many said....
"Professional" Auto-mode.
But i use Av on the norm and M when using flash.
Since I've got my camera, I've never touched "P" before....

I like how you can "roll" (using the "Main Dial"...one next to the shutter button) the exposure on the TV vs AV settings and still get the correct exposure. [50 -- 4.5] <click, click, click> [15 -- 8.0] "Ah, that's more of the dof I need." Sure, you could set the Av to 8.0, but now I can see that I'm going to have a hard time with this hand held so I can just quickly roll back to get a little faster shutter speed at the cost of my apature setting's dof without removing my eye from the view finder. This is probalby one my most used settings.

You can't do this in the auto modes.

The P mode on my camera is underused, but it is in reality quite useful, as I've discovered recently. Personally, the choice between Av and P mode depends on the weaknesses, strengths and inherent properties of the lens that I use.

When I use the kit lens, I stick to Av mode and shoot consistently at f/8, closing down insanely to f/22 (at the cost of losing image quality due to diffraction) if I need a very long shutter speed for surreal-like motion blur. This is because I understand that the kit lens is very soft wide open, and sharpens up nicely at f/5.6 and f/8.

However when I'm using a telephoto lens, increased depth of field is nice to have for shots at very long focal lengths. Many times, I've made the mistake of shooting in Av mode and using the lens wide open. This leads to a shallow depth of field and often mistakes in focus. I then regret when I return home and find an image is slightly out of focus, but could have been well done with a smaller aperture with no loss as far as shutter speed is concerned. For example, a picture of a slow-moving animal shot at 1/2000s at f/4 might have looked much nicer at say, 1/500s f/8.

Hence, I use the P mode for telephoto shots unless I intentionally want a very shallow depth of field. In this mode, the camera automatically stops the lens down if conditions are very bright, and it opens up the lens aperture in less-than-ideal conditions to maintain a fast enough shutter speed for handholding, together with IS and high ISO in most cases.

P is also great when you want a "nonphotog" taking a pic - you still shoot raw, have iso control and you can prevent the oncam flash from popping.

I do most shooting in Av, but occasionally use P for walking around similar to the style explained by FretNoMore.

I never thought about using it for tele, but that sounds like a good idea. Thanks for the tip fWord.

Great tip....

Jon

I've been using P mode whenver the flash is on my camera because I virtually always use it as a fill flash. Eventually, I'll need to learn how to use the flash in M mode, but I've been very happy with how it performs in P so far.

I love P mode when you pass the camera to someone else to take a pic of you, or if something just pops up, and you need to take pic at that right moment! but normal shooting, always M or Av

IMHO, this is the best answer. "P" is just another tool on your camera to use. Use it to your best advantage. It'll get you a good shot nearly everytime as long as the guy behind the lens know it's limitations.

I don't use P very often but it is nice to have if you want the camera to do the thinking but you want to be able to use RAW for PP. Can't get that in the full auto modes.

Unless you just accept the suggested exposure values (in which case you might as well use the fully automatic mode) the camera doesn't do any more thinking for you than in Av or Tv. I seldom just point and click in P mode, I first adjust the exposure to my liking. You have just as much control in P as in Av or Tv, if not more.

I guess that was my point, you can accept the values the camera gives you if you want. The camera will give you those values and it will also write the image in RAW, which it will not do in fully automatic modes... it just gives you a little of both worlds