NCBD - New Camera Body Day

First test picture...

There is something that keeps bringing me back to stare at this pic.
Maybe it is the contrast of the "spheres" against 4 almost identical quadrants vs the light on a row of tomatoes on a windowsill...or both.

Congrats @Robert1950 !! You certainly have an "artistic eye"

I've had 36hrs with camera and so far it is 5 thumbs up. I have done more photography since spring than in the last few years. So I finally got a subscription four months for Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop (used that in the previous decade) - one of my retirement goals that I hummed and hawed about for two years (I kick myself for not doing it sooner). My Nikon D80 was doing the job, but was not quite keeping up with job recently. Imagine that for the past few years you have been driving a very well maintained old Dodge Dart with a carbureted slant 6 and it did the job. But then your driving needs became more demanding and it wasn't keeping up and you got something more modern with a 24v fuel-injected V6. Better performance and fuel economy, etc. It really does the job for you now.

The focusing system and processor speed really impressed me. I was at a rodeo in Tofield last June and missed at least a half dozen good shot (like always) because the camera was too slow or just wouldn't focus properly at all. There have been a couple of other times this year when the camera didn't respond fast enough, or not at all, and I missed some good shots. I've always been Type A/Anal-retentive about my photography, but little else in my life, except guitar setup, feel, playability (that old aging weak puny little girly man hand again). But I am still very Type B about my playing - I am well aware of my limitations (but that is another story)

DaddyDog said:

For your first test picture, did you have it on 'auto'? It's a stunning picture, but I've never been patient enough to learn about aperture and shutter settings. If I get a picture of that quality, it's purely by chance!

Click to expand...

Pretend the camera is a tap for a water hose. The aperture is the knob that turns on the water. The more you open the tap, more water flows through. Shutter speed is how long you leave the tap open.

Aperture priority allows you to pick how far you "turn the knob". Wide open lets in tons of light but no depth of field. If you want high depth of field you let less light in through the lens by closing the aperture.
Shutter priority allows you to decide how sharp the photo will be. 1/8000 will stop a hummingbirds wings, or you may want to keep them blurry and pick a lower shutter speed.

So lets say for a perfect picture, auto mode takes a picture at 1/1000 of a second at f11. If I decide 1/1000 is too fast, (maybe you want some sort of blur) lets say to 1/500 of a second. Twice as much light is getting through at the same aperture, so a good picture at 1/1000 f5 is perfect, but at 1/500 will be overexposed. So changing the shutter speed one stop means you have to adjust the aperture 1 stop as well. In this case you want 1/500 at the next higher number f stop which is f16. 1/250 @f22 etc.....


f/1, f/1.4, f/2, f/2.8, f/4, f/5.6, f/8, f/11, f/16, f/22, f/32, f/45, f/64, f/90, f/128,

Every time you close the aperture 1 step you are letting in half the light. If we use lumens, @F11 lets say 600 lumens through the aperture, but at f22 its only 300, at f32 is only 150, etc...
Same for shutter speed. Every step up or down is 1/2 the light or twice the light if you go opposite.

But the cool thing is if you are in shutter priority mode, you don't have to pick the highest shutter speed. If I am in shutter priority and I want lots of depth of field, I want a high f stop number. So turn the shutter speed as low as 1/60th of a second for a hand held picture and you will get a nice high f stop number.

Depth of field is how far and how close things will be in focus. If I take a picture with a 50mm lens at f2, anything 2 feet in front and 2 feet behind the object will be in focus. if I set it up to f22, everything within 22ft of the object will be in focus. If you want to see your depth of field there is a button you can push that will show you what the camera actually sees. Normally when you look through your camera you see everything clear, but if you push the button for depth of field you are looking through the camera with the aperture closed at whatever point you have it set at. So at f22 it will be a very dark looking picture, but you will see how much is in focus compared to say f2

Ever notice pro photographers, taking blind pictures? Ie holding the camera above their heads and pointing in the general vicinity of the object they want a picture of, say some dude in the middle of a crowd? They are using an 18mm wide angle lens set at f22. Guaranteed, the picture will be in focus at f22. Everything within about 20-25 feet will be in focus in that picuture.

300mm lens with 1.4x teleconverter (420mm) 1/100 second at f8 hand held no tripod.

Not going to do that with a smart phone
I also use exposure compensation and record a -3ev and a +3ev image as well

I edited my explanation of shutter and aperture as there were a few mistakes... Here's a perfect example of why you I don't use auto or program. I use aperture priority 90% of the time. First picture is 1/500 f9, the second picture is 1/80 f22. Standing in almost the same spot same bird, and same focal length of 70mm. Low depth of field f9 leaves the rock out of focus as it's about 30 feet back, but at f22 it's in focus