Camera setting help

[Denise40]

I will be in Disney World this weekend. I bought a new camera, Canon SX20, and I was wondering what would be good settings to use to take photos of the Christmas lights? I have been practicing on the auto mode and using the flash and they are just ok? I can do manual, but not really sure what settings to use. Any help would be appreciated.


Denise

 

[ukcatfan]

Since you understand manual, I suggest that you do a little trial and error once you are there. Be sure to keep your shutter speed fast enough. Remember the 1/focal length rule and that should help. Then set your aperture to as wide as you are willing to use and then set the ISO until it gets the exposure you want. If going full manual, remember that you might need to adjust your setting when zooming in/out.

 

[seashoreCM]

You are better off using manual. If you can take pictures of Christmas trees or of strings of lights draped temporarily on the outside of your house, that will give you some advance practice. Try taking a test picture close up (say 3 feet away) from the tree or lights and using those settings for an entire scene.

If you do want to go automatic, chances are you will get better results setting the Exposure Compensation to minus 2 or 3. This prevents the camera from trying to make the whole nighttime shot look like day. Also be aware that the overall complexion of each shot in terms of brightness will vary depending on how many Christmas lights are in the scene.

When you take multiple shots with different exposures (bracketing the exposure) using automatic mode and by changing the exposure compensation, be sure to frame each shot the same way. Otherwise the camera will make adjustments on its own depending on the amount of Christmas lighting and other bright content before applying the exposure compensation resulting in apples to oranges comparisons.

Bracketing the exposure by adjusting ISO does not work unless the camera has shutter speed and aperture constrained (probably by maxing out) for both (or all 3) shots.