Beginner Noobie, But Not A Noobie

SteveNBarbara

SteveNBarbara

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Steve
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Hi all.

I've been taking reasonably good photos for a good few years now, but with the arrival of our first child I decided I wanted to get a proper camera to take really good shots with.

After speaking with a few friends who are all a lot more experienced than me I decided to go for a Canon EOS 700D.
I only got it on Wednesday but am already happy with a lot of the shots, and am slowly working my way through the settings.

I'm looking forward to learning lots from you guys and girls, so any hints and tips you want to throw my way will be gratefully received.

Thanks
 
Welcome to the forum Steve. You've bought a good camera for a first DSLR but its difficult to offer any tips until we know your capability and style of photography. The best tip is to just use the camera, learn its functions, and post a few pics that your happy with on here and let us make comments/suggestions on them. You'll find there's plenty of experienced help available, but don't be disappointed if your "good photo" is taken to pieces albeit in a constructive way, that's the way we learn (y)
 
As you have been taking photos for a few years I'm guessing you are probably familiar with the Exposure Triangle. If so, then your camera will allow you to explore that to the full. If not, then getting an understanding of it will be a great benefit. There are tutorials on here and the Web.

Agree with Trev's comments - take lots of pictures, if you are not happy post them here saying why you are unhappy and someone will offer a suggestion.

Dave
 
Thanks for the replies guys.

I'll post a few pics this evening for you to criticise and tell me what can be done better :)
 
OK guys, sorry for the delay, but here are 4 photos that I'm particular happy with. I could never hope to get anything anywhere near as good as this until now.

This is my daughter Chloe, she is 5 months and 3 weeks old :)









I know they could be better, but not sure how.
The first 3 were taken by me, all without flash but auto ISO, the last was taken by the wife, again with no flash and auto ISO
 
I'll kick this off- they are all out of focus to be brutally honest

You maybe need to use manual focus and make sure her eyes are pin sharp

like this shot I took last Summer, look at her eyes

DSC07973 by lesmoxonphotography, on Flickr

Les
 
It would help if we had the EXIF data, to see what settings you had on the camera before we could advise.
 
Lez325 said:
I'll kick this off- they are all out of focus to be brutally honest

You maybe need to use manual focus and make sure her eyes are pin sharp

like this shot I took last Summer, look at her eyes

Les
Click to expand...

Thanks for the reply

I understand where you're coming from with the last one, or maybe even the last two, but the first two look in focus to me.
Or perhaps the first two are not as out of focus as the last two?

Thanks again for your comments - I'll only get better with people's help
 
Lez325 said:
I'll kick this off- they are all out of focus to be brutally honest

You maybe need to use manual focus and make sure her eyes are pin sharp

Les
Click to expand...
I agree that they are all out of focus to some degree and manual focussing could help. However, with your 700D (I don't know what lens your using) the AF should be good enough to get the focus spot on so long as you get the AF point on the nearest eye. Are you using spot AF or a large group of AF points? I have a feeling your using zone or 19 point AF, if you are, the camera will decide which point to use to focus on. Try single point AF and make sure that point is on the eye, you can move the single point around the screen so that it is lined up with the focus area (eye) that you want so that you can compose the picture correctly.
Also, keep an eye on the background and remove clutter, it can spoil a good shot by adding distractions.
Your going in the right direction Steve, keep practicing, you have a gorgeous model to work with :-)
 
Trev4 said:
I agree that they are all out of focus to some degree and manual focussing could help. However, with your 700D (I don't know what lens your using) the AF should be good enough to get the focus spot on so long as you get the AF point on the nearest eye. Are you using spot AF or a large group of AF points? I have a feeling your using zone or 19 point AF, if you are, the camera will decide which point to use to focus on. Try single point AF and make sure that point is on the eye, you can move the single point around the screen so that it is lined up with the focus area (eye) that you want so that you can compose the picture correctly.
Also, keep an eye on the background and remove clutter, it can spoil a good shot by adding distractions.
Your going in the right direction Steve, keep practicing, you have a gorgeous model to work with :)
Click to expand...

Pretty sure it would have been AF, and probably multiple point focus too - I've only recently discovered you can choose which point you can select as being the focus point.

Thanks :)
 
I really like single center point focus and setting the camera to use back button focus on the xxxD series Canons. Focus on the eye (that's GOT to be sharp!) and then recompose.
You could do with getting an understanding of exposure (shutter speed/aperture/ISO) and how aperture affects depth of field (low number=wide aperture=less DoF) and then just experiment. They say the first 10k photos will be your worst (!) - get shooting, get critical of what you shoot, then get better :-)
 
While Landwomble is right, I would respectfully suggest that Steve should take things a step at a time. Back button focus is something I use all the time, but I wouldn't suggest Steve uses it until he has a bit more experience and confidence, at this time, its an extra complication that can be learned later.

You can do the same thing by half pressing the shutter button when you have focussed on the subject, hold it down at half press, then recompose before you press it all the way to operate the shutter. To explain that to Steve, when you have the centre focus, or single focus point on the eye (in this instance), half press the shutter button, this will focus the camera and meter the exposure, by holding the button in the half pressed position, the camera will remain locked in the same focus and metering setting, then you can move the camera slightly to recompose while keeping the camera focus correct for the eye. I hope this makes sense.

Getting an understanding of the exposure triangle is important, its something you need to do a bit of reading about, and then try to apply it in the camera, experiment, try different settings, and see what happens. There's a thread here that will explain it in some detail, but I suggest reading it a bit at a time and trying to get a grip with it. There's a lot of numbers to learn (exposure settings, shutter settings, ISO settings), you wont just learn these parrot fashion, but as you use the camera and apply them, they become second nature to you. What I'm saying is, give it time, use the camera and play with the settings, learn as you go along and it will all fall into place in time.
 
SteveNBarbara said:
Thanks for the reply

I understand where you're coming from with the last one, or maybe even the last two, but the first two look in focus to me.
Or perhaps the first two are not as out of focus as the last two?

Thanks again for your comments - I'll only get better with people's help
Click to expand...

I took the liberty of adding an un-sharp mask to the image- as a comparison to your original shot using Photoshop CS 5

can you see the difference?




Les
 
Lez325 said:
I took the liberty of adding an un-sharp mask to the image- as a comparison to your original shot using Photoshop CS 5

can you see the difference?




Les
Click to expand...

Yes, very noticeable - mine is a lot softer, yours is much sharper. I'd imagine if you had the RAW image it would be even better.

My new computer is arriving this week so I will be able to install Photoshop & Lightroom - old PC just wouldn't run it lol.

*********
Didn't get a chance to upload Exif data for you guys, but will really try to do it today for you.
 
SteveNBarbara said:
Yes, very noticeable - mine is a lot softer, yours is much sharper. I'd imagine if you had the RAW image it would be even better.

My new computer is arriving this week so I will be able to install Photoshop & Lightroom - old PC just wouldn't run it lol.

*********
Didn't get a chance to upload Exif data for you guys, but will really try to do it today for you.
Click to expand...

Yes RAW files are easier to work with and much larger of course- look forward to seeing some more images in due course

Les
 
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