The main thing is keep experimenting. I can honestly say, when I shoot auto, my photos suck.
I just realized how good you guys really are
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I do get what you are suggesting... play with one variable at a time until I start to see how it is effected by the others. That makes perfect sense to me and I do plan on trying that!
This may sound stupid...lol. I am still a little afraid of it. This really is all new technology to me. When I find the right screen in the camera menus to make a change, I am a little afraid to “click on it” thinking I will mess up my camera. I am good with computers! I need to convince myself this is just another computer... that can always be reset : ) ....I know... silly
Yep.. and really most of the settings that you need to play with on the camera to do all of this are controlled by the dials and whatnot, you don't really need to dive into the menus to do much of anything.
Don't be afraid of it, after all you are maintaining the water quality for a bunch of live animals and they are doing fine..
I pulled out my ancient EOS 20D a few weeks ago and it didn't seem to notice that I hadn't touched it in several years.
Also, and I can't stress this enough. Invest in the Adobe Creative Cloud Photography package. It's 10 bucks a month and well worth the cost.
Once I made the leap into Lightroom and learned just how easy it was, It gave me a way to manage my photo catalogs easily and editing them is simple.
Don't be afraid of it, after all you are maintaining the water quality for a bunch of live animals and they are doing fine..
I pulled out my ancient EOS 20D a few weeks ago and it didn't seem to notice that I hadn't touched it in several years.
Also, and I can't stress this enough. Invest in the Adobe Creative Cloud Photography package. It's 10 bucks a month and well worth the cost.
Once I made the leap into Lightroom and learned just how easy it was, It gave me a way to manage my photo catalogs easily and editing them is simple.
najer
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Lots of great information and great pics above, don't be afraid of your camera and use it a lot to get a feel for it.
All the things wrong with this pic!
Hand held.
Pumps on. (I never turn my pumps off just to get a pic!)
Wrong settings for a coral pic.
Auto focus. (I use auto focus and then tweak manually, "you can't polish a turd" was the best piece of advice I ever got, focus!)
Jpeg. (I am too lazy to learn editing software.)
2 day old glass!
I took 4 pics and settled on this one, I picked the camera up and adjusted the iso to 640 (wrong but I was trying to allow for the flow and "stop" the heads) F 5.6 (wrong, that was from fish pics earlier) and 1/200 (again set for fish) and went click (4 times).
I download to my laptop using Windows photo gallery and adjust contrast and brightness as required and croped.
Don't try too hard or you will get frustrated, from going click to saving this took about 3 - 5 minutes, it's just a "quick snap".
Also as above, it's digital and you can take as many shots as you want!
My one tip, also mentioned above is to have the tip of the lens against the glass completely square on and the camera level to cut distortion.
All the things wrong with this pic!
Hand held.
Pumps on. (I never turn my pumps off just to get a pic!)
Wrong settings for a coral pic.
Auto focus. (I use auto focus and then tweak manually, "you can't polish a turd" was the best piece of advice I ever got, focus!)
Jpeg. (I am too lazy to learn editing software.)
2 day old glass!
I took 4 pics and settled on this one, I picked the camera up and adjusted the iso to 640 (wrong but I was trying to allow for the flow and "stop" the heads) F 5.6 (wrong, that was from fish pics earlier) and 1/200 (again set for fish) and went click (4 times).
I download to my laptop using Windows photo gallery and adjust contrast and brightness as required and croped.
Don't try too hard or you will get frustrated, from going click to saving this took about 3 - 5 minutes, it's just a "quick snap".
Also as above, it's digital and you can take as many shots as you want!
My one tip, also mentioned above is to have the tip of the lens against the glass completely square on and the camera level to cut distortion.
Yep, I have been using Lightroom for 13 years. Today's version is leaps and bounds better than anything from the past. I love it. The key is to learn to use it right. Tons of online videos on Adobe's web sight to watch and use as a reference.
Absolutely. It did take me a little white to figure out how to make it work for me, but once I did, I wouldn't use anything else.
The wife still uses Photoshop for all of her edits. She just doesn't have the patience to learn LR.
Once I learned the power of its cataloging, I never looked back.
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And your picture still came out amazing! Great advice, thank you.Lots of great information and great pics above, don't be afraid of your camera and use it a lot to get a feel for it.
All the things wrong with this pic!
Hand held.
Pumps on. (I never turn my pumps off just to get a pic!)
Wrong settings for a coral pic.
Auto focus. (I use auto focus and then tweak manually, "you can't polish a turd" was the best piece of advice I ever got, focus!)
Jpeg. (I am too lazy to learn editing software.)
2 day old glass!
I took 4 pics and settled on this one, I picked the camera up and adjusted the iso to 640 (wrong but I was trying to allow for the flow and "stop" the heads) F 5.6 (wrong, that was from fish pics earlier) and 1/200 (again set for fish) and went click (4 times).
I download to my laptop using Windows photo gallery and adjust contrast and brightness as required and croped.
Don't try too hard or you will get frustrated, from going click to saving this took about 3 - 5 minutes, it's just a "quick snap".
Also as above, it's digital and you can take as many shots as you want!
My one tip, also mentioned above is to have the tip of the lens against the glass completely square on and the camera level to cut distortion.
Trust me when I tell you, I am soaking in everything everyone here is saying : ) I’ve been a “photographer“ now for almost 2 weeks lol. What I will say is this. I am having a blast playing with my new toys : ) I keep stumbling in to some pretty cool pics and I have been using the limited editing software that came with my iPad. I have free access to several editing software packages. They came with the Camera, but none of them are the ones people keep mentioning.
Which of these would you choose to use (if any)
PhotoMirage
PaintShop
VideoStudio
Painter Essentials 7
AfterShot
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I had a feeling you would say that lol (which is why I haven’t downloaded them)
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I downloaded Photoshop : )
Photoshop if you're looking to do composites or otherwise alter the image.
Lightroom is king for someone looking to catalog and process the images.
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Yeah... I started watching a few YouTube videos on these apps... before I started paying for one. I am leaning towards the Lightroom actually. I don’t think I would ever use much of photoshop.
Oh, and one important thing that you don't really hear about much.
Once you start shooting RAW, you will notice that your images straight out of the camera sorta suck. There's a very good reason for it. It's raw data, it has to be processed in order to look right. I've heard of some folks saying, "Yeah, I shoot raw and my photos are just fine straight from the camera." It's just not true...
Just keep that in mind...
Once you start shooting RAW, you will notice that your images straight out of the camera sorta suck. There's a very good reason for it. It's raw data, it has to be processed in order to look right. I've heard of some folks saying, "Yeah, I shoot raw and my photos are just fine straight from the camera." It's just not true...
Just keep that in mind...
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Oddly enough, I have picked on that one a little. “Raw” lets more “data” in on the pic... i Have started shooting in Raw. I’ve noticed it is harder to get the auto focus to... you know... actually focus, but the pics look much better after I pass them thru my iPad photo editor. It just seems like I can do more to it. I was kind of guessing raw would work even better for me once I started shooting manual.
Yes it will. And one main thing I noticed about raw files, they tend to look out of focus or at least just a bit soft until you process them.
I just did a bad thing.... I ponied up for a slightly used Olympus OM-D E-M10 Mark III and a 7artisans 60mm F2.8 Macro lens.
I blame the fish...
I blame the fish...
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I blame the fish for a lot of things!
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