DIGITAL CAMARAS

*wisecat* · 05-10-2006, 06:21 PM

Digital Cameras

Not that many years ago the digital camera would have cost you $1000 and it was the size of a football. Now a days you can buy them for $50 and they will fit in your shirt pocket, hell you can even get a phone with a built in camera now. Most all professionals are converting to digital now because they donÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t want to be left behind. The 35mm SLR is losing out slowly for a couple of reasonsÃ¢â‚¬.¦

Film/processingÃ¢â‚¬..?With 35mm you took the picture then, you had to go to a photo developer to get them to turn your roll of film into prints, this could consume days and lots of money. What you got back was all you had, no chance of working out the problems with the photo; you were at the mercy of the developers.
If you could develop your own pictures it took a lot of time and money because of the chemicals and equipment you needed to have. The art of darkroom workÃ¢â‚¬..?is just that Ã¢â‚¬Å“an artÃ¢â‚¬.?. It took a lot of practice to learn and besides who wants to dedicate half of their home to darkroom status and then play in deadly chemicals for hours.

So why even own a 35mm camera? The one thing the digital camera has not been able to do is match picture quality, but all of that is changing now. 35Ã¢â‚¬â„¢s capture light on film and imprint an image that is true to exactly what is allowed thru the lens to the unexposed film (itÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s a chemical reaction). Digital cameraÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s have to reproduce the image using a computer chip and create the image using a series of colored squares (pixels) and then store it to memory. The first digitals used a floppy disk to store the information. Have you ever tried to load a picture onto a floppyÃ¢â‚¬..?lol. Today, memory cards will fit on the end of your fingertip and hold 100Ã¢â‚¬â„¢s of images.

The days of the darkroom are gone, now you can develop your own images, usually with software provided with your camera or just use WindowÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s media. If you want to own a digital darkroom, then there is just one name Ã¢â‚¬Å“Adobe PhotoshopÃ¢â‚¬.?. You can now turn your darkroom into a mobile operation. Just take you laptop computer and go. The coolest thing to me about digital is Ã¢â‚¬Å“the film is free, take all you wantÃ¢â‚¬..?if you donÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t like what you takeÃ¢â‚¬.¦deleteÃ¢â‚¬.¦deleteÃ¢â‚¬.¦delete and you havenÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t spend a dime! Only print what you want and put the rest on CDÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s for later use.

If you are going to buy a digital camera, here are some thoughts to consider before purchasingÃ¢â‚¬.¦

1. What are you going to use it for? Are you going to take snapshots on vacation or pics of the kids and all your activities. Then you only need 3-4 mega pixels, which will print 8x10Ã¢â‚¬â„¢s without losing image quality. If you want to print bigger than that then you will need more pixel power. Most people will never print larger than 8x10.
2. What features do you want? Do you want to control all the settings or do you want an automatic that will just point and shoot. ItÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s all your call.

Then there are people like me who would like to one day soon start making money taking pictures and do it as a professional. Well, donÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t fearÃ¢â‚¬..?you got the money, itÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s out there. Nikon and Canon have waged a war to see who can out do the other one and the serious picture takers are getting some digital cams that blow away the best 35Ã¢â‚¬â„¢s have to offer. Nikon now offers a 20 mega pixel camera, and all those 100 different lens they make for the pro film cameras fit right on the digitals. The ProÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s only have to buy the camera body to go digital.

One last thing Ã¢â‚¬Å“Printing your digital picturesÃ¢â‚¬.?. ItÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s as easy as going to a place like Wal-Mart or an Office Depot buying some photo paper and picture quality ink for your home printer and doing it yourself. You can always edit your pictures and email them to your photo shop and let them print them for you, or take the card out of the camera and take it to Wal-Mart, pop it in their machine and tell it what you want. How easy is that? Now get off of your bum and go take me some pictures. IÃ¢â‚¬â„¢m waitingÃ¢â‚¬.¦
if you have any questions post em.....

wIggy · 05-10-2006, 06:55 PM

what are all the little features I get on my dial when using my Nikon Coolpix 4600, there's what looks like a man running, a mountain, a woman wearing a hat, and a head with a star by it, and a selection called scene. I have no idea what any of these are used for, and I stick to the normal camera icon. I'd like to know how to use these, I think it would improve the quality of my photo taking experience.

*wisecat* · 05-10-2006, 07:19 PM

Quoting: wIggy

what are all the little features I get on my dial when using my Nikon Coolpix 4600, there's what looks like a man running, a mountain, a woman wearing a hat, and a head with a star by it, and a selection called scene. I have no idea what any of these are used for, and I stick to the normal camera icon. I'd like to know how to use these, I think it would improve the quality of my photo taking experience.

coolpix are nice camaras
your camara has a automatic setting where it does the thinking for you, which you have propably used. If you set the camara to the icon of the man running you are telling it that you are going to shoot an action shot(the subject is moving) and it will adjust the setting to compensate. The women with the hat tells it you are shooting a portrait, and the head with the star behind it tells it that you are shooting a night time shot. I hope that helps I use those setting alot

"Better three hours too soon, than one minute too late."

— William Shakespeare: 16th-17th century English poet and playwright

wIggy · 05-10-2006, 07:22 PM

so I'm assuming the mountain would be a scenery shot mode?

*wisecat* · 05-10-2006, 07:24 PM

yea i forgot that one, you are correct

*G_Man* · 05-10-2006, 07:25 PM

Did I blow it purchasing this cam?!!?

So far, I am pretty happy. However, I am having trouble with two things. Both have to do with taking photos of my daughter at gymnastics.

1) The continuous Mode seems to take only 2 or 3 shots and then the camera waits and waits for processing. You know how to get more shots per 'session' after pressing the shutter button?

2) I am often taking these pix in typical indoor lighting (ie. poor lighting, but not dark) with a no flash restriction. If I use the default or slow shutter speed I get the motion lines (too much exposure, right?) and if I use the "running man" setting my pix are VERY dark. I can program one set of manual settings and wondered if you could suggest some things. I might not know what they mean, but could probably set them nonetheless!!

Thanks in Advance for Your Help, Wisecat,

G.

*wisecat* · 05-10-2006, 07:32 PM

let me google that camara and look at it's specs to see how much shutter adjustment it will let you make and i'll get back to you. I know what's happening but i need to see if you can compensate for it

*G_Man* · 05-10-2006, 07:37 PM

Quoting: wisecat

let me google that camara and look at it's specs to see how much shutter adjustment it will let you make and i'll get back to you. I know what's happening but i need to see if you can compensate for it

Sweet. Thanks.

My Second Job

*wisecat* · 05-11-2006, 08:50 AM

here are my thoughts G after reading the specs

question1
after reading the specs i think that's all you are going to get, because after the second shot it drops out of that mode and you propably will have to reset

question2
indoor lighting without a flash handicaps you coming in the door, in order to shoot action shots you need a fast shutter speed which in turns means plenty of light. the ISO can be changed to help ,try setting it at 800, take a few shots and judge, then start dropping the setting to see where your best results are.I have not seen the building your in so you should do a few things next time you are there, look up at the lighting and judge where they are pointed and try to shoot from the brightess spot you can get to, if you can get floor level and kneel down and shoot upward towrds the lights you may can cheat enough light in to make it work but you might have to also edit the pic in photoshop if the light shows up in the pic but thats better than no pic at all. you are a smart fellow study the room and just try to get in the best light even ambient light will help, if they would let you use flash...proplem solved hope this helped if it don't take me a pic of the arena and let me study

*G_Man* · 05-11-2006, 01:42 PM

Quoting: wisecat

question2
indoor lighting without a flash handicaps you coming in the door, in order to shoot action shots you need a fast shutter speed which in turns means plenty of light. the ISO can be changed to help ,try setting it at 800, take a few shots and judge, then start dropping the setting to see where your best results are.I have not seen the building your in so you should do a few things next time you are there, look up at the lighting and judge where they are pointed and try to shoot from the brightess spot you can get to, if you can get floor level and kneel down and shoot upward towrds the lights you may can cheat enough light in to make it work but you might have to also edit the pic in photoshop if the light shows up in the pic but thats better than no pic at all. you are a smart fellow study the room and just try to get in the best light even ambient light will help, if they would let you use flash...proplem solved hope this helped if it don't take me a pic of the arena and let me study

hmmm.....

Well, I shoot at various indoor buildings. Essentially the equivalent, give or take, of a typical highschool gymnasium.

I have increase the ISO before, but the pix always came out VERY dark. However, I never thought of putting them on PS afterwards.

Also, there are times that I can get at ground level and times that I am unable... I will mess with both.

I will take some pix from where she trains tonight and post them as it will give you a better idea of what I mean.

Thanks for the help...

My Second Job

*wisecat* · 05-11-2006, 05:41 PM

wish i had done better for you but the pics might help me. indoors+ bad lighting+no flash= tough shot

*G_Man* · 05-11-2006, 05:43 PM

Quoting: wisecat

wish i had done better for you but the pics might help me. indoors+ bad lighting+no flash= tough shot

I just thought maybe one of those other fancy adjustments might help!!

My Second Job

*G_Man* · 05-11-2006, 08:50 PM

Quoting: wisecat

wish i had done better for you but the pics might help me. indoors+ bad lighting+no flash= tough shot

Tried it at 800 ISO... Pix are just a touch grainy and my camera set itself at Good, down from Best, but I think that mostly affects size...

My Second Job