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taking photos of conifers in snow

ken_adrian Adrian MI cold Z5

16 years ago

HOSTA ... there you go ...

the new camera is fully adjustable.. but the automatic settings aren't quite good enough for taking pix of conifers [near the dormant hosta] in snow...

i am guessing its an aperture issue .... making the camera's eye ball not open so far .... am i close????

what basic adjustments might i make ???

thanks

ken

PS: keep in mind.. i have the attention span of the 5 year old son ... long answers are appreciated.. but .. well ... i lose track of reality easily ... lol

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Comments (4)

jel48
16 years ago
Hi Ken,

I'll be good.... aperture smaller yes, while keeping the shutter speed the same, which actually using a bigger number for the f-stop. Or, shutter speed faster while keeping the aperture the same. Alternatively, I suspect your camera has an ISO setting (all of the Canon digitals I have do) and if your ISO is set at any number larger then 100, set it to 100 then do a test pic. If it's too dark (I don't think it will be) then set ISO to 200, and so on. I can't tell you what buttons you have to use to make these adjustments because they may not be the same as mine. You should be able to find them in your camera manual easily, just look in the index or in the section that discusses manual settings.
jel48
16 years ago
Actually, found your camera's manual online. It says that if you set the camera in Manual mode, it's default ISO setting is 80. So, if everything else happened to default to a friendly setting for you, just switching from auto setting to Manual might be worth a try. I can't do to much digging in the camera manual today because I'm at work and you wouldn't want that long of answer anyway ;-)

If you don't have your camera manual handy, there is one here - look on pg 69 for ISO settings:

Here is a link that might be useful: Ken's a630 Canon manual
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ken_adrian Adrian MI cold Z5
Original Author
16 years ago
i have played with it enough to know how to change all the settings.. as you know.. i just don't what all the settings mean ...

i will change from auto to manual ....and make sure ISO is 80, 100 and 200 ..

thanks

ken
jel48
16 years ago
Ok, here's your quickie lesson on ISO settings.

ISO was the speed that the photographic negative materials could handle creating an image at. A lower ISO number is used in bright light. So, with film, you might have bought film that was ISO 100 (or maybe even lower) for flash pictures or to use in bright sunlight or when the sun was glaring off of snow! 200 ISO is also used in fairly light settings - normal outdoor daylight for example. 400 can also stretch to normal daylight conditions. If you were shooting in extremely low light with no flash, you might have sprung the big bucks and bought film with an ISO of 800. Higher ISO films were also used for fast action. Take a photo of something moving fast with film ISO 200 and no flash and you get lots of blur. Take the same photo with ISO 800 and blurring was minimized. I believe they make(made) film with a higher ISO then 800 but it sure wasn't common.

In the digital world, ISO refers to how sensitive the image sensor in the camera is to the amount of light present. The higher the ISO, the more sensitive the image sensor and therefore the possibility to take pictures in low-light situations or to take pictures of fast action.

So digital ISO isn't quite the same as film ISO but it works the same. Use a low ISO setting for bright natural light or flash and use a high ISO setting for low natural light or fast action.

Check it out by taking the same photo using a variety of ISO settings. Your conifers in snow are perfect subjects 'cause they'll stand still and let you take all the pics you want, just like hostas do :-)

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