Checklist

About an hour ago I went running down the block to try and get a couple shots of the 10:00 fireworks at the County Fair.

As I headed to the end of the street, I reminded myself that I really need to get a checklist together.

I did remember to put the memory card back in my camera but I forgot to format the card and, worse, I think I still had ISO set at 100 from a little earlier in the day. I didn't realize that I had autofocus off until I took a few shots and then accidentally switched off IS while fumbling in the dark for the autofocus switch.

So what do you guys do to return your camera to a known state? Do you keep track of every setting you change on a shoot and then reset them one by one? Does turning the camera off and back on take care of most of the important settings or is it sometimes necessary to do a Clear Settings from the menu?

I'll start trying to get in the habit of switching Autofocus and IS to on everytime I put my camera in the bag. What else should I be trying to remember?

One mistake is enough to make you remember forever.

I remember when I got my first digital camera and left the ISO at 1600 for about a week, because I had never thought about changing ISO on the fly with a film body (one roll...one ISO), so because I wasn't changing film, it never crossed my mind.

I generally try to reset my camera to some generic settings before I put it away.

However one of the first things I do on opening my bag for shooting is to mentally gauge the light and try to determine my shooting speed, aperture and ISO based on what conditions are and what I am shooting. That is before switching on the camera and normally I can get pretty close. As for AF and metering, I normally shoot landscapes so they don't generally change!

IS mode (1 or 2).

Not a big one but has caught me out more than any other issue.

I just set them for the appropriate conditions at the time and the for the result I'm trying to achieve.
During any shoot, it's a given my settings WILL change. What I start the day with are not likely to be the same as what I finish with. If they are it's simply because that's what's been appropriate for what I was after at the time.

I've got a shoot tomorrow, but don't know what the weather will do so there's no point setting my camera for something that I can't predict.

I usually get to the location, take a meter reading and set the camera accordingly. As conditions change I meter again and ma the appropriate changes.

One of my "rituals" is to reset the camera to my personal "default" settings after I'm done shooting something.

I also lay the camera on it's side with the battery door left open while charging the battery.