5 Tips for using your compact
1. Switch off Red Eye Reduction feature.
This feature slows down your camera and means that you can miss shots, also red
eye can be easily removed in software.
2. Use the scenes mode (most compacts
have this its in the menu section) these set your cameras functions for specific
situations meaning you miss less shots in these situations.
3. Try switching off your flash when
taking portraits and using something like a table lamp placed close to your
subject. To get proper colour change your white balance to tungsten this is a
picture of a bulb on the menu. Dont forget to change it back when you finish or
everything outside will be blue. Not good unless you are going for a sci fi
look. Be aware if you use an LED light tungsten wont work and you will need to
experiment.
4. Opposite to the above if you take
pics outside in sunshine.( For anyone under 6 sunshine happens when its not raining/
snowing and you can see a yellow ball in
the sky, oh and its warm without your coat.) Instead of having the sun behind
you shining onto the subject which causes squinting put the sun behind them so
you are facing into the sun. Use their body to block the sun to prevent it
shining into your lens. Then set the flash to be on all the time this will
light the subject and the sun will give them a nice glow. Note if you set the
flash to auto it more than likely wont fire.
5. Compacts focus is relatively slow so
if you are taking children running around you are going to get a lot out of
focus. Try half squeezing the shutter release while focusing on a point then
hold that and wait until the child reaches that spot then push the release the
rest of the way. This should improve the speed of the camera.
These are
just a few initial points and i will add some more soon, however if you have
any questions please email me at martoniphoto@yahoo.co.uk
and i will try and answer it.
