Wiley Shooting Digital: Pro Tips for Taking Great Pictures with Your Digital Camera, 2nd Edition
Contents
1. Mikkel Aaland Before You Shoot You ll increase the odds of making great digital photos if you take a few moments to ground yourself in some basics It s useful for example to understand why shooting digital is inherently different from shooting film And even if you already own a digital camera you should know whether the camera you are using or the one you are thinking about upgrading to is the right digital camera for your needs This chapter will get you started on the road to making great photos with your digital camera Chapter Contents Bridging the Film Digital Gap The Right Digital Camera Knowing Your Digital Camera Software Solutions Accessories That Make a Difference Finding Up to Date Information and Support LOOHS NOA AYOdAd E CHAPTER 1 BEFORE YOU SHOOT E N Bridging the Film Digital Gap Since many of us remember the world of film whether as skilled photographers or point and shoot users it s comforting that much of the nomenclature of digital pho tography is similar Digital cameras have lenses f stops and shutters just like the old cameras Light is captured and recorded Images are stored and shared However it is important to know that the differences are also great and if you apply your old knowl edge indiscriminately to the digital world you are likely to get unsatisfactory results or not fully utilize the capabilities of the new medium Let s look at some of the similari2. Focal length equivalents will vary between different digital cameras with differ ently sized sensors Don t expect a 1 1 relationship between the angle of view of a lens used on a digi tal camera and the lens used on a 35mm film camera Finally the smaller the sensor the less chance your camera will provide an effective wide angle view dV9 IVLIOIG WTld JHL ONIOGIUA W N CHAPTER 1 BEFORE YOU SHOOT E Aperture and Depth of Field It s not only focal length numbers that are different in the digital and film worlds Aperture comparisons between a digital camera and a 35mm film camera at least when it comes to the depth of field won t always give you the same results either Apertures which are found in most lenses work in tandem with shutters to control the amount of light that passes through to the sensor or film Aperture size is expressed as f stops which represent the focal length f of the lens divided by the diameter of the aperture the number following the slash The notation f 2 therefore represents an aperture diameter that is 1 2 the focal length of the lens and f 16 is an aperture diameter that is 1 16 the focal length of the lens f 2 is wider than f 16 and allows more light to pass through the lens Theoretically an f 5 6 setting on any lens on any camera digital or film will always let in the same amount of light Depth of field is the range of acceptable sharpness in front of and behind the plane of focus
3. and the camera one based on knowledge and experience that produces the best results Take shutter lag There has been a lot of improvement over the last few years but many digital cameras still suffer from it You press the release button expecting to get the shot only to see later that the camera actually released the shutter a good sec ond or so later What can you do if you own such a camera Well first of all you need to find out how bad the lag is I learned a very simple test from my Los Angeles Times friend photographer Tony Barnard Sitting at a coffee shop in San Francisco he showed me the test found in Chapter 4 Testing for Shutter Release Lag Once you figure out the lag if any you can learn to anticipate a shot Knowing your camera is such a huge and important subject that I ve devoted a whole series of sidebars to it throughout the book In fact it s one of three topic areas that PII cover in sidebars throughout the chapters you ll meet the other two shortly In most chapters you ll see sidebars titled Know Your Camera and you ll find techni cal explanations that you can apply to just about any digital camera Know Your Camera sidebars include General Quality Test Chapter 1 Controlling Depth of Field Chapter 3 Testing for Shutter Release Lag Chapter 4 Frame and Focus Chapter 5 What Goes Wrong with Digital Cameras Chapter 6 The Sensor Inside Chapter 7 File For
4. digital cameras to cap ture full motion video and sound As you ll see in Chapter 11 many photographers are using their digital cameras to create short 15 to 30 second clips that have both practi cal and entertaining value The Right Digital Camera Digital cameras come in all sizes shapes and prices with various types of features There is no such thing as a single perfect digital camera regardless of cost However there is such a thing as the right digital camera for you and it all depends on your needs An expensive professional digital camera with interchangeable lenses may not be the right camera if you are running out the door to shoot your child s first day at school and you really need only a lightweight consumer digital camera that fits in your pocket On the other hand if you are shooting fast moving action you may be satisfied only with the responsive controls typical of a professional or prosumer level digital camera Before I get specific about matching your needs with the technical aspects of dig ital cameras I want to remind you and myself that there is much more to making good photographs than the technical details In the process of focusing on a camera s capabilities and features it s easy to lose the forest for the trees The fact is some of the most memorable images in history were taken with cameras that we might consider crude think Mathew Brady and his Civil War photographs or Edward S Curtis
5. lens capability if you are shooting groups Most digital cameras feature wider than normal focal lengths but are they wide enough This is where going to a camera store and picking up the camera to test it is invaluable As you will see in Chapter 4 some photographers find it handy to frame difficult to get shots with LCDs that swivel and move independently of the camera lens Important Features for Shooting Fast Moving Action Chapter 5 Shooting things that move really fast cars horses athletes etc is very challenging and nearly impossible if your digital camera is not up to it An ideal action digital camera will first of all be extremely responsive There are lots of tests for this but here s the bottom line when you turn on the camera does it respond immediately When you press the shutter release does the camera respond quickly and continue to respond The camera should have shutter speeds in excess of 1 1000th of a second and a shutter priority mode It should have a burst mode capable of capturing three or more frames per second More is better of course It should have a fast zoom lens capable of 200mm 35mm equivalent or longer focal length and a fast autofocus with assist Ideally it will have some type of image stabilization option to minimize camera or movement shake Usually this capability is built into the lens but not always It should have higher ISO option settings up to 1600 ISO to enable fast shutter spee
6. print Nowadays a typical 5 megapixel consumer digital camera cap tures around 2576 x 1932 pixels which is plenty enough resolution to produce a decent 11 x 14 print Table 1 1 shows what size prints you can reasonably expect to produce from various resolutions Note that these are general guidelines and actual results will vary depending on the type of digital camera and output device used and other qualities of an image such as sharpness color and content Print Size inches Need at least 1 3 megapixels 1280 x 960 pixels 11 x 14 6 1 megapixels 3008 x 2000 pixels Table 1 1 Optimal pixel resolutions needed for desired output specifications assuming 200 dpi print resolution Considering Exposure Latitude Most point and shoot digital cameras pack lots of pixels into physically small sensors with a trade off in quality Exposure latitude between light and dark for example may not be nearly as good as film provides Low light situations may result in extremely noisy images On the other hand digital single lens reflex SLR cameras generally use larger sensors with better exposure latitude and low light capabilities Why do larg er sensors give better latitude Larger sensors in general have larger photo receptors for each pixel and can capture more light and generate more photo electrons In addi tion all sensors have some level of electronic noise In subsequent chapters I ll get more into the subject of ext
7. 0 Shooting Your Stuff that shots of inanimate objects under natural light can be made successfully with just about any digital camera However for more flexibility and ease of use with studio lights certain features in a digital camera are desirable For example a digital camera with a PC synch outlet for a strobe trip cord is very handy Nearly all professional digital cameras and many but not all prosumer level digital cameras have one Not so with consumer level digital cameras they almost never have one There are workarounds if your digital camera lacks this outlet as we see in Chapter 10 An accurate viewfinder is always helpful when shooting objects Only SLR digital cameras or cameras with electronic viewfinders have accurate viewfinders The workaround to this is to use the LCD display for framing but this uses a lot of battery power Macro lens capabilities can be critical especially if you are shooting small objects such as coins and stamps Close up attachments are an option but sometimes they are cumbersome and not nearly as effortless to use as a digital cam era with a good macro lens Wide ranging zoom capabilities are also useful Longer than normal focal lengths flatten perspective which is often desirable Wide angle capabilities are also useful Important Features for Shooting Minimovies and Panoramas Chapter 11 Not all digital cameras offer a minimovie option Ironically the more expensive the dig ital camer
8. As you ll see throughout the book the ability to control depth of field either to isolate a subject from its background or to put more objects in focus is an important creative technique As most of you probably already know wider f stops yield a limited depth of field while narrower f stops increase the depth of field But depth of field is not determined only by f stop It s also determined by the focal length of a lens longer lenses produce less depth of field the distance from the lens to the object the closer the lens is to the subject the less depth of field and just as important for the purpose of this discussion by the size of the sensor or for that matter the film For a very technical discussion of this topic I invite you to visit my website www shooting digital com From a purely practical point of view just as with small film formats the smaller the sensor your digital camera uses the more depth of field is produced for any given lens f stop or distance Depth of field therefore varies from one digital camera model to another and rarely will you get what you might expect without some experimentation Later in the book I ll give you a way to test your digital camera and lens for depth of field and Pll show you ways to deal with more depth of field than you want l amp r Know Your Camera Controlling Depth of Field in Chapter 3 For now just know that this is a potential issue with huge implication
9. Resolution Film resolution expressed as resolving power is a function of the size and structure of the silver halide particles Fine Medium or Coarse the emulsion thickness and the actual size of the film 35mm 120mm etc Digital camera resolution is based on the number of pixels contained in a particular sensor The number of pixels is expressed either as an A x B form with A representing the number of pixels in the width and B the number of pixels in the height of a sensor for example 2576 x 1932 pixels or as a total number of pixels for example 4 976 832 pixels or more simply 5 0 megapixels In general the more pixels a sensor is capable of capturing the finer the detail that is recorded I must qualify this statement though because there are some sensors on the market notably ones created by Foveon and Fuji that squeeze more color data from each pixel thereby making a side by side pixel to pixel comparison between dV9 IVLIOIG N1ld JHL ONIOGIA E W CHAPTER 1 BEFORE YOU SHOOT E sensors less meaningful Read more about this in the Zooming In appendix under Sensors Expanded Sometimes the documented number of pixels may include pixels that aren t even actively used introducing yet another variable Some of the earliest digital cameras captured only 640 x 480 pixels 3 megapix els just enough pixels to fill a small computer monitor and barely enough to produce a decent 3 x 4
10. a 35mm film camera Many people have been taught that a 50mm lens is a normal lens for a 35mm camera but as you can see by the math 50mm doesn t fully represent the normal human field of view Many pros consider a 35mm lens normal for a 35mm film camera Some manufac turers list the diagonal measure of a sensor with the camera s specifications Knowing what you do now you ll better understand why it s more difficult to find a digital camera equipped with a lens that has less than a 30mm focal length equiv alent Until recently it was only the more expensive digital cameras with larger sensors that gave you the option of wider lenses Even then if you place a 12mm fisheye lens on say a Nikon D 200 it will still be equivalent to only about 20mm on a 35mm cam era which is wide but not super wide Accessory add on lenses can extend the wide angle capabilities of many digital cameras to a degree however there is some trade off in quality Camera manufacturers are getting around this limitation by designing lenses specifically for smaller sensors The Nikon DX lens series for example includes a rela tively affordable 10 5mm F2 8 fisheye with an equivalent field of view of 15 75mm Kodak also offers a clever solution to the wide angle conundrum a digital camera with two lenses and two sensors The Kodak EasyShare V570 boasts a 23mm equivalent lens and a 37mm 117mm equivalent zoom lens built into one body Bottom line
11. a or the more professional it is the less likely it is that the camera will have the capabilities of capturing these short but extremely useful full motion sequences After you read Shooting Digital Minimovies in Chapter 11 I think you will agree that having this capability is extremely attractive Another way to extend the ability of your digital camera is through special soft ware that stitches multiple images together and creates either a panorama or an object movie All of this is detailed in Chapter 11 Just about any digital camera can be used to create simple panoramas However if you want to create professional quality panoramas or object movies you ll need a digital camera that has exposure and focus control overrides You ll also need to use a tripod and it really helps if your digital camera comes with the appropriate screw mount Knowing Your Digital Camera You may be surprised to hear that many of the professional photographers featured in this book used cameras not labeled professional But even a point and shoot camera in the hands of a professional can be effective It s not just a matter of having a good eye A pro also knows one thing that many others don t understanding both the strengths and weaknesses or your equipment is critical A weakness can be overcome only if you know it exists In short it s not the digital camera that makes a great photo it s the relationship between the photographer
12. ade off it lowers the effective resolution of the sensor because the sensor must devote half of the possible photoreceptor cell locations to stor age and thus those locations can t generate image information From a practical point of view the key things to keep in mind when looking at the capabilities of a digital camera shutter are Just like with a film camera an important creative option can be using a digital camera that provides some control over a range of shutter speeds especially if you are shooting action Most prosumer and professional digital cameras come with a shutter priority or manual mode Rarely do consumer level digital cam eras offer such options At this time most prosumer and professional digital cameras feature shutter speeds in excess 1 1000th of a second which is plenty fast for most shooting situations Although extremely slow shutter speeds are an option on most digital cameras keep in mind that shutter speeds slower than 1 15th of a second often introduce electronic noise which shows up as blotchy patterns in continuous tone areas Some digital cameras offer noise reduction modes with some trade off in quality dV9O IVLIOIG WTld AHL ONIOGIUA M O CHAPTER 1 BEFORE YOU SHOOT E O Some mechanical shutters provide faster synch speeds when used with electronic flash This can be important if you are trying to balance flash with bright daylight Bottom line Just about eve
13. and his American West images Sure the right tool for the right job is preferable but as you ll see throughout this book a creative person can overcome many of the limitations of a less than perfect digital camera I learned this lesson many years ago when one of my mentors Gordon Clark encouraged me to spend a few days shooting everything with a 200mm telephoto lens even close up portraits It wasn t easy but I soon learned to compen sate and actually came up with some decent images When I went back to using other lenses I saw the world in a whole new way and my photographic abilities were vastly improved VUAWVO IVLIOIC LHOI JHL E CHAPTER 1 BEFORE YOU SHOOT E N Matching Your Needs to a Camera The following section matches the desirable features and specifications of a digital cam era with several general photographic shooting categories These categories are the subject matter of Chapters 3 through 10 of this book I hope in lieu of recommending actual camera models and manufacturers this summary will give you a start toward learning what to look for in a digital camera and ultimately you won t buy more or less camera than you need For readers with needs not met by a single digital camera I suggest considering acquiring multiple cameras As digital cameras continue to drop in price this becomes an increasingly realistic option With the exception of the landscape architecture category I don t get i
14. ds And last of all an ideal action digital camera should be lightweight and have a sturdy and durable body construction Yeah I know you are going to pay more for these fea tures But they really make a difference Important Features for Travel Photography Chapter 6 Travel photography includes just about every photographic category you can imagine such as portraits landscapes and action This makes selecting an appropriate digital cam era all the more difficult You will need an extremely versatile camera for example one that includes a zoom lens with a wide range of focal lengths Add on lenses are just one more thing you have to carry and they can be easily lost You ll also want a digital cam era with reasonable power consumption It s nice if it uses commonly available batteries An on the road digital camera is also ideally durable and lightweight If you are traveling to certain parts of the globe you don t want a flashy camera that says Hey gt gt look at me Making backups of your digital images is always important but when you are on the road it is particularly challenging Some digital cameras store data on durable mini CDs others have dual memory slots so you can make backup copies from within your camera Digital wallet like devices are always an option but again they mean one more thing to lug around and possibly lose VUANVO IVLIOIG LH IA JHL CHAPTER 1 BEFORE YOU SHOOT E Im
15. e an image smaller for the Web or for e mail or if you want to increase the perceived resolution Remember when you increase resolution this way you are adding only pixels not detail Also keep in mind that when you interpolate data up or down your image invariably softens suggest that when you re using Photoshop for example you apply a slight Unsharp Mask filter when you finish resizing Accessories That Make a Difference Accessories extend the capabilities of digital cameras sometimes quite profoundly Custom fitted underwater casings for example open a new world of visual explo ration Wide angle lens attachments help overcome many of the optical limitations of digital cameras Special LCD shades make it possible to review images even in the bright sun Important accessories are mentioned throughout the main text of the book but whenever you see a sidebar with this icon x you ll find additional information on accessories that I feel make a difference These include Add On Lenses Chapter 3 Removable Memory Storage Chapter 4 From the Kitchen Drawer Chapter 5 Backup Devices Chapter 6 Tripods Chapter 7 External Light Meters Chapter 8 External Artificial Lights Chapter 10 Batteries Chapter 5 Underwater Casings Chapter 11 Finding Up to Date Information and Support Hardly a day goes by without a new digital camera or accessory hitting the market We are in an explosi
16. e is a point where the electronic and chemical worlds completely diverge For example most digital cameras are equipped with an LCD screen that provides near instant image playback This may sound like a small thing but in reality preview ability has important significance As you ll see throughout the book LCD previews can be used in a variety of ways from displaying technical data on the quality of an image to precise framing to icebreakers that help your subjects relax as you photograph them Another area that has no counterpart in the film world is file formats Most dig ital cameras give you a choice of how you want the digital data saved You can opt for a small file size via various JPEG file format compressions or for high quality albeit large files saved in the TIFF file format An increasing number of digital cameras even allow you to save the pure unprocessed data that comes directly from the sensor This RAW data as it is called can then be processed on a desktop computer with imaging software more sophisticated than the processing in the digital camera itself Control over white balance is another point of divergence between digital and film Shoot daylight film under tungsten or fluorescent lights and you ll get a greenish cast With a digital camera you simply adjust the white balance or let the camera do it for you to compensate for the different light values Digital also goes beyond film with the capability of many
17. ending exposure lati tude and shooting successfully in low light situations Bottom line Unlike film cameras digital cameras depend on a complex array of electronic components all of which contribute to image quality or lack thereof Lenses Getting the Numbers Right Digital cameras just like film cameras rely on lenses to collect and focus light onto the sensors If you ve used a 35mm film camera you are probably familiar with how lenses are numerically differentiated in terms of focal length The stated focal length is the distance between the optical center of a lens and the medium that captures the image either the film or sensor surface when the lens is focused at infinity For example a lens with a focal length between 40mm and 55mm is considered normal and covers a field of view similar to human vision about 50 degrees Focal lengths less than 40mm are considered wide angle and focal lengths over 55mm are considered telephoto with a narrower field of view A lens designated as wide angle will expand the field of view and long telephoto lenses narrow the field of view and appear to bring far objects close Zoom lenses provide a range of fields of view often going from wide angle to telephoto A versatile zoom lens might provide a range of focal lengths say from 28mm to 200mm And so on When shopping for a digital camera it s natural to want to compare focal lengths of digital camera lenses with those of fami
18. follow ing sidebar and they cover a wide range of software related issues including Changing Pixel Count Chapter 1 e Blurring a Background Chapter 3 Digital Fill Flash Red Eye Removal and Sharpening an Out of Focus Image Chapter 4 Changing a Background and Adding Motion Blur Chapter 5 Grabbing Stills from a Minimovie Chapter 5 Changing the Quality of Light Chapter 6 Fixing Keystoning Chapter 7 e Fixing Exposure Chapter 8 Changing an Object s Color or Texture Chapter 10 Removing Noise and Other Artifacts Chapter 11 Having noted what can be fixed with software it s equally important to know that sometimes it is difficult or impossible to fix an image with software such as times when you have Radically distorted images caused by a wide angle lens or faulty optics although software such as DxO Optics Pro can help e Radically overexposed or underexposed images Bad facial expressions or other subject induced problems A blank image as in leaving a lens cap on you d be surprised A totally out of focus image software sharpening works only to a degree Not enough resolution software interpolation adds only pixels not details Software Solutions Changing Pixel Count You can use software such as Photoshop Photoshop Elements and Genuine Fractals to increase or decrease the number of pixels generated by your digital camera This is useful when you want to mak
19. fringing which is often found at the color transition areas where interpolation can lead to color artifacts and loss of image detail The image on the left below for example suffers from a lot of color fringing while the image on the right displays a more acceptable level of color fringing There isn t much you can do about color fringing except if possible save your images in the RAW data format and process the images outside the camera a RAW Data Revealed in Chapter 2 VUANVO IVLIOIG ANOA ONIMONY BY CHAPTER 1 BEFORE YOU SHOOT E Software Solutions The potential of imaging software is something to always keep in mind while shooting Knowing what can and can t be fixed will streamline the way you shoot and ultimately make you a better photographer Several commercial imaging software applications are available among the more popular ones are Photoshop Photoshop Elements Paint Shop Pro Apple Aperture Adobe Lightroom and Microsoft s Digital Image Suite Many digital cameras come bundled with one of these software packages or a manufacturer s own basic imaging software I ve writ ten books on using Photoshop and Photoshop Elements so I am partial to those programs Throughout the book I ve devoted a second series of sidebars to many of the most common photographic issues that imaging software can address These sidebars are titled Software Solutions and are marked with an icon like the one in the
20. her excellent venue for viewing and touching equipment so I ve also included links to trade shows such as the Photo Marketing Association International PMAI and PhotoPlus Expo LuOddAs ANV NOILVWUOAUNI ALVG OL dN ONIGNIA 8 oO
21. ixels photo receptors in a tiled mosaic pattern left The filters allow one wavelength of light to pass and a given pixel therefore records only one color right The processing of the digital data from the sensor is the most complex part of the process and also the most variable Unless you ve chosen to save the image in the RAW file format the camera s onboard processor will organize the separate R G and B pixel values into RGB data and perform a variety of other steps before assembling the final image This processing may include compression in the JPEG file format or no compres sion in the TIF file format You ll learn more about these formats in subsequent chapters After light is captured by the sensors and the processing is complete the infor mation data is passed on in digital form to some sort of built in memory system or more commonly to an external storage medium such as the commonly used Smart Digital SD xD Picture Card or CompactFlash CF card The sensor and electronic system that carry out the task of digital processing and storage are built entirely into the camera and cannot be easily swapped and upgraded By comparison film has individual characteristics dependent on brand and manufactur er and those characteristics are independent of the camera itself You can easily switch from a fine grained film to a fast grainy one by simply replacing one roll with another in the camera Comparing
22. liar 35mm film cameras But although a digi 6 tal camera s normal lens will capture approximately the same field of view as a film camera s normal lens the physical focal length considered normal is usually much shorter Because of this difference it s typical to refer to 35mm equivalent focal length when discussing lenses for digital cameras and Pll use that term throughout this book A 50mm lens that is considered normal for a 35mm film camera would be considered a telephoto lens for many digital cameras Why Because most digital cameras use sensors that are smaller than 35mm film sometimes only a quarter of the size and the smaller the sensor the shorter the normal focal length Figure 1 3 illustrates this point With the same physical focal length a 35mm film camera which has a 24mm x 36mm frame size would show a somewhat larger field of view with less magnification than a digital camera with a rel atively large sensor such as the Nikon D200 with a 23 7 x 15 6mm sensor With the 8 8 x 6 6mm sensor on the Sony DSC F828 we have a much smaller field of view and more magnification dV9O IVLIOIG WTld JHL ONIOGIUA M U o CHAPTER 1 BEFORE YOU SHOOT 35mm film frame 36mm X 24mm Nikon D200 frame 23 67 x 15 6mm Figure 1 3 The same focal length will produce different fields of view depending on the size of the sensor film Different digital cameras use different size sensors so f
23. mats Chapter 8 Built In Flash Chapter 10 Lenses Chapter 9 LCDs Chapter 9 Adjusting White Balance Chapter 11 VUAINVO TVLIDIG ANOA ONIMONY BG CHAPTER 1 BEFORE YOU SHOOT BO Know Your Camera General Quality Test There are many things to consider when determining the overall performance of your digital camera How does it perform in low light How well does it handle a wide dynamic range of light Are the colors accurate How well does the autofocus work How well does the expo sure system work Is the camera responsive Increasingly camera reviewers are establishing standardized tests that answer these and other questions and publishing their findings on the Web and in print You can easily test for yourself at least two important quality issues image sharpness and color fringing You ll need an image processing program such as Photoshop Photoshop Elements Paint Shop Pro Microsoft Digital Image Suite or proprietary software that comes bundled with many digital cameras To start 1 Pick a scene that includes a lot of color and detail such as the one shown here 2 Use your camera s controls to select the highest resolution setting If you can set your camera to save your file in the TIFF format If you must save your image as a JPEG use the best quality setting meaning less compression Since this is a test of the imaging capabilities of your digital camera saving your data in RAW data fo
24. nto pixel resolution Sure pixel resolution is an important criterion in choosing a digital cam era and for that reason I address it elsewhere in the book but the amount of pixels you need depends on what you are doing with the final image and not so much on the subject of what you are shooting Shooting RAW Chapter 2 For maximum quality and flexibility you will want a digital camera capable of saving the RAW data that comes off the sensor Most if not all prosumer and professional cameras offer this option Increasingly more consumer level digital cameras such as the Kodak EasyShare series cameras offer RAW capabilities as well In Chapter 2 Pll dis cuss when and when not to shoot RAW and how to work with the RAW data once you have saved it Important Features for Shooting Portraits Chapter 3 Portraits generally benefit from using longer than normal focal lengths The focal length need not be too long a typical portrait lens is anywhere from 85mm to 135mm 35mm equivalent well within the capability of most zoom lenses included with most digital cameras Accessory add on lenses can extend less than optimal lens capability but with a trade off in quality Another important feature to look for in a digital cam era is aperture priority metering With the choice of f stops comes the ability to control depth of focus which as you will see in Chapter 3 is useful Some consumer digital cameras lack this option but include a so called
25. ocal length equivalents will vary For example 30mm is considered a normal focal length for the Nikon D200 while 12mm is considered normal for the Sony F828 For now most camera manufac turers provide 35mm focal length equivalents when necessary either on the lens hous ing or in the manual If you can t find the 35mm focal length equivalent for your particular camera you can refer to the owner s manual or to the manufacturer s web site With some digital camera specifications you will see a number referred to as a 35mm multiplier factor Multiply this number by the focal length of your lens to get the 35mm camera equivalent for your digital camera For example if the multiplier is 1 5 and you are using a 100mm focal length 1 5 x 100mm 150mm which is the 35mm equivalent for your digital camera If all else fails there is a relatively straightforward relationship between the diag onal dimension of a sensor or film and what is considered a normal focal length If for example the diagonal measurement of a sensor is 12mm as it is for the sensor used in the Nikon Coolpix 990 then the normal focal length is 12mm The Nikon actually comes with an 8mm 24mm zoom lens which translates to 38mm 115mm in 35mm film equivalence The diagonal measurement for the sensor in the Canon EOS 5D is the same as 35mm film about 43mm which explains why a 50mm normal lens on a Canon camera will provide the same field of view on
26. portant Features for Architecture and Landscape Photography Chapters 7 and 8 Up to this point I have not brought up image quality as an issue However when you turn your lens to landscapes and architecture photography image quality becomes a critical part of the success of your work Not only does the camera you use need to have the capability to produce high quality images but you also need to know how to get the most quality out of it This subject is dealt with in great detail in Chapters 7 and 8 Higher pixel counts in excess of 5 megapixels are definitely a plus World class optics are also important You ll want more camera controls including ideally both exposure and white balance bracketing You ll also want the ability to save your image files in a variety of file formats including the extremely versatile RAW data format which you ll hear a lot about throughout the book Considerations for Shooting Black and White Chapter 9 Black and white photography is experiencing a renaissance Beyond the obvious a black and white picture is often simply more beautiful than a color version black and white images stand out in a world saturated with color images even though some digi tal cameras boast a black and white mode you can produce great black and white photos with just about any digital camera In Chapter 9 PII show you how Important Features for Tabletop and Close up Photography Chapter 10 You ll see in Chapter 1
27. portrait shooting mode which essen tially selects the widest possible aperture to diminish the sharpness of the background LCD preview capability is absolutely a must when shooting portraits Most digital cam eras come with this feature but some LCDs are bigger and more easily viewed than others If you choose to use external electronic strobes for your portraits and you need to trigger the strobe from the camera a digital camera with a PC synch outlet is con venient There are ways around this which you ll see in the appropriate chapters Important Features for Photographing Children and Events Chapter 4 Children move constantly and so do guests at weddings birthday parties and other events Many times they move very quickly Some digital cameras are more responsive and better equipped than others to shoot subjects that move Anyone who has digital folders full of out of focus shots or just missed moments knows very well what I am talking about I go into a lot of detail about digital camera shutter release lag in Chapter 4 Camera response is therefore a very important thing to consider when looking at the specs of a digital camera Another factor is an effective built in flash Some built in strobes are more powerful than others Some are more accurate than others If the built in strobe isn t enough does the camera have the capability to accept an external dedicated strobe Not all do You ll definitely want a wide angle
28. rmat isn t as useful RAW data an option in mostly higher end digital cameras generally isn t touched by a digital camera signal processor and therefore doesn t suffer or benefit from onboard on the fly image processing 3 Place your camera on a tripod and make an exposure Since this is a general test it s okay to use your camera s autoexposure settings 4 5 Now open your image with an image processing program Using magnification and navigation tools zoom into the areas with most detail Look for sharpness or lack thereof For example look at the image on the left When magnified it appears sharp a result of both good optics and appropriate camera image sharpening The image on the right may at first glance look sharper than the one on the left But it s actually been oversharpened by camera processing and upon magnification appears quite pixelated An image that appears soft or out of focus might be a result of poor optics or it may not Many digital cameras apply a slight blur to the image during onboard image processing to prevent color fringing Also keep in mind that sometimes what you see as sharpness is really just increased contrast again produced by image processing Don t panic if your test image looks too sharp contrasty or too soft Many digital cameras allow you to select from a variety of sharpness settings Refer to your camera manual Now find an area with an abrupt color transition Look for color
29. rything you know about film cameras and shutter speeds will apply to shooting digital Metadata One of the biggest differences between film cameras and digital cameras is the amount of metadata that can be generated Metadata is information encoded onto the film or into the digital file Some film cameras embed the date and time a picture was taken and with a special data back you might be able to encode some other type based information This is nothing compared to the data that is typically encoded by a digital camera Digital camera manufacturers have standardized the way this metadata is saved into a format called Exchangeable Image File or EXIF for short To read this EXIF data you ll need imaging software such as Photoshop or Photoshop Elements or the imaging software that often comes with a digital camera Not only can you use EXIF data to see what type of digital camera was used but you can also see the date f stop shutter speed ISO and whether a flash was on or off Some of the higher end prosumer and professional cameras even allow you to hook up a global positioning system GPS to your camera so you can encode in the EXIF metadata the exact spot in the world where you shot a particular image Metadata can be used by printing software to determine print resolution It can help you organize your digital images and even make you a better photographer by giv ing you a handy reference to your camera settings Beyond Film Ther
30. s especially for example if you are shooting a portrait and you want the background to go more out of focus and it doesn t Bottom line The amount of depth of field produced by your digital camera might not be what you expect You ll need to experiment Shutters Another Way to Control Light Digital cameras need shutters to control light just like film cameras Some digital cam eras use a shutter that is mechanical not unlike the shutters used in a film camera The shutter be it a leaf shutter or a focal plane shutter controls the amount of light that strikes the sensor The faster the shutter the less light is allowed past the slower the shutter the more light Remember from basic photography that varying the shutter speed and changing the f stop is how you get more control over the amount of light hitting the film or sensor and also how you can stop or blur action or control depth of field Theoretically digital cameras can use the sensor itself as a shutter This requires a special sensor in which the pixels themselves are told electronically when to turn on and when to turn off As you can imagine using this electronic method can produce much faster speeds than anything mechanical Engineers for Olympus for example have produced speeds of 1 18 000th of a second Speeds like this are inherently imprac tical because they require so much light and such a wide aperture Also using sensors as shutters in this way has its tr
31. ties and differences Capturing Light Electronic vs Chemical Both digital cameras and film cameras capture and record light However film cameras rely on a chemical process Silver halide crystals change when struck by light forming a latent image that is revealed upon development with a chemical agent Figure 1 1 sum marizes this familiar process BRE R ERE ER EERE ERP E PEPER ERE eel P F Figure 1 1 Film is both a capture and a storage device The image is revealed upon chemical development Digital cameras rely on a much more complex system that includes several inter connected electronic components and sophisticated image processing Let s look at this system in more detail The Digital Capture and Storage Process Digital capture starts with the sensor chip This chip contains an array of photorecep tors each capturing one pixel of the ultimate image The number of receptors in the chip is what determines the camera s maximum resolution In most systems a layer of filters is applied over these receptors see Figure 1 2 so that each one can capture only one of the primary colors red green or blue These colors are the basis of the RGB color model used in all computer imaging Electronic processing either in the camera or in a computer then combines these separate R G and B values into RGB pixels in the image aa Figure 1 2 In a typical sensor red green or blue filters cover individual p
32. ve and exciting time and it s hard to keep up The information present ed in this book is meant to be timeless within reason giving you solid tips and advice on the process of shooting digital For up to date information on specific cameras printers and other products related to digital photography I suggest you visit the com panion website for this book www shooting digital com There yow ll find links to web sites that offer timely information You ll also find links to user forums and camera clubs where you can read what other impartial users have to say and links to work shops and classes that lve found particularly useful PII update the links as need be You ll also find links to many of the sources mentioned throughout the book Although websites are very useful for comparing prices and specifications ultimately you ll want to see or touch a piece of digital photography equipment It s especially important to hold a digital camera and gauge how it fits and feels and to see whether or not the con trols are intuitive or if the LCD is bright or big enough National store chains such as Ritz Camera and CompUSA are good places to start for so called consumer and pro sumer digital cameras Stores that offer professional digital cameras are rarer but you can find them by checking local Yellow Pages listings under Photography I ve pro vided links to stores around the country at www shooting digital com Trade shows are anot
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