Beginner Camera help

N

Nightshade

Suspended / Banned
Messages
8
Name
Stu
Edit My Images
Yes
Evening folks,

I joined this forum back in 2012 looking for some advice on getting my first camera. A kind member donated me a Fujifilm S5700 and I enjoyed learning some basic photography skills, with varied success :)
After a while the camera became used for special occasions only - I guess because my phone got capable of taking snaps, and so the Fuji came out for holidays and the like, but not much more. I'm also slightly ashamed to say it often was left on the Auto setting.

Anyway, my interest in pushing photography beyond basic snaps took hold once more and over the past month I've spent more time with the camera in hand, trying to up my game. But I'm running into a couple of problems - I wonder if any of you would be kind enough to offer some advice?

  • Biggest killer of my shots is the focus. Although the camera is capable of taking some good quality pictures, I find the display on the back awful by today's standards. Once I allow the camera to auto focus I'm left looking at the image on the screen thinking... am I in focus or not? Often I'm way off. Way, way off. There is a manual focus but it's a little difficult to access, buried in a menu and only accessible in some modes, and even then.....am I in focus or not - no idea until I upload the pictures to the computer :( Also if I try take pictures of the sky, the auto focus just goes way off and shouts af! at me - I'm not sure how to fix that?
  • Low light is a bit of a nightmare. Recently while camping I tried taking shots of rabbits at dawn - they were just about ok on Auto settings. I also tried taking shots of the stars - there was an amazing night sky, but all I got on auto was a black shot. I tried the shutter setting and set it as long as possible and still got black shots. I wondered if it's something I'm doing or a limitation of the camera? Similar problems tonight with an amazing sunset - most of my shots lost all the colour and beauty of the sky.
I'll try upload some of the pictures if that might help, but would be grateful of any advice.

Thanks!


*Edit here we go:

This nearly worked



What happened here?


Now all we're out of focus and look dreadful


This looks in focus on the camera screen but guess what.... I didn't want the stream in focus


Again, the camera is presumably picking up the hill rather than the boy (my boy) but it looks in focus on the screen
 
Last edited:
The sunset shots you took are always difficult because your camera will expose for the brightest areas which will cause the rest to be underexposed - as you have found out - all you can do here is to use a tripod and make 3 or more exposures and then combine them in an HDR program.

The second shot you show is simply motion blur caused by either jerking the camera as you exposed or using too slow a speed.

In the third shot you have upped the ISO speed but this doesn't really change much since the main problem with your camera exposing for the brightest part - the sky - still remains - in this case all you have done is increase the noise due to the high ISO - once again the only real answer here is to use a tripod and multiple exposures.

The OOF shots could be caused by your camera's AF not being set correctly - I use centre point focusing on my Canon cameras - in this case you need to check the manual for your camera and set the AF points up properly.

And a camera usually cannot focus on a blank area such as the sky since AF depends on locking onto details in a pic and a blank area will defeat it - in this case you will have to manually focus - or try to.

Trying to take pics of stars will almost always result in a black shot since, although the stars may look bright to you, in reality they are extremely dim and definitely require a tripod and a longish exposure .

And don't forget that what we see when looking at a beautiful scene is not what the sensor will record since we are there with the landscape all around us and the sensor only has what the lens projects onto it - this is one of the most difficult things we have all had to learn.

But it is well worth learning and what makes photography such a brilliant and absorbing hobby - so just keep at it and remember all of us on here are still learning even after many years - so welcome and good luck!
 
Last edited:
petersmart said:
The sunset shots you took are always difficult because your camera will expose for the brightest areas which will cause the rest to be underexposed - as you have found out - all you can do here is to use a tripod and make 3 or more exposures and then combine them in an HDR program.

The second shot you show is simply motion blur caused by either jerking the camera as you exposed or using too slow a speed.

In the third shot you have upped the ISO speed but this doesn't really change much since the main problem with your camera exposing for the brightest part - the sky - still remains - in this case all you have done is increase the noise due to the high ISO - once again the only real answer here is to use a tripod and multiple exposures.

The OOF shots could be caused by your camera's AF not being set correctly - I use centre point focusing on my Canon cameras - in this case you need to check the manual for your camera and set the AF points up properly.

And a camera usually cannot focus on a blank area such as the sky since AF depends on locking onto details in a pic and a blank area will defeat it - in this case you will have to manually focus - or try to.

Trying to take pics of stars will almost always result in a black shot since, although the stars may look bright to you, in reality they are extremely dim and definitely require a tripod and a longish exposure .

And don't forget that what we see when looking at a beautiful scene is not what the sensor will record since we are there with the landscape all around us and the sensor only has what the lens projects onto it - this is one of the most difficult things we have all had to learn.

But it is well worth learning and what makes photography such a brilliant and absorbing hobby - so just keep at it and remember all of us on here are still learning even after many years - so welcome and good luck!
Click to expand...

Thats an excellent explanation to all the points brought up.
 
Thanks that is very useful.

Is there anything I can do to combat not being able to tell if I'm in focus or not?
Short of buying a new camera with a decent preview screen...
 
Nightshade said:
Thanks that is very useful.

Is there anything I can do to combat not being able to tell if I'm in focus or not?
Short of buying a new camera with a decent preview screen...
Click to expand...
It's not a decent screen you need, but simply one with good focus checking and manual focus setting aids, such as easily and quickly accessible screen magnification up to pixel level, and focus peaking. But from your discussion of your focus problems it sound to me as though your problems at this stage aren't because your camera's AF system isn't good enough, it's simply that you don't understand how to use it. Reading through your camera manual's section on AF with the camera in your hand to try everything out should help a lot.
 
I the pictures of the child the camera has focussed on different areas of the scene and not on the child, as others have said you need to read the manual and see how to change the settings as to which focus points are used.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top