This camera thing is getting to me. You all know – more means less. Where was that dial? How did I do that again? Somethings are just not staight foward to my backwards mind. Was that aperture big or number big, was it big is big but ya get less . … consider I am working with less mind wise here. Really, I do know that smaller Fstop# = larger diameter of arperture and less depth of field. But knowing and doing, well apparently my camera and I are not one on this issue. My old camera was wonderful. It was a nice Minolta Maxxium 5000 with some great zoom, telephoto, wide, and closeup lenses I had purchased along the way. But it used oh my gosh – horror – film – that I had to pay to get developed. Smart cookie ( I did mention my backwards mind right?) that I am, I gave it to my roomates nephew and bought this Sony F828.
My Minolta was easy to use. It (not I) took some great pics on automatic. I learned what lense produced what outcome. What settings did what. It was simple. No purple glow around tree brances. We had moments in the forest where we were one. Not so with this dang Sony. Now I imagine you the reader have now figured out that you can put what I know about photography on the head of a pin. Just don’t ask me to take a picture of the pin because the dumb Sony does not have that closeup thing (lense) that will let you nor can you buy one. Nope, once again, no can do. This camera needs an owner that knows what the heck they are doing.
So, here is the F8 picture on a tripod in aperture priority setting so I did nothing but change the aperture setting. The other pics taken the time on total automatic came out normal. I am such a goof. Whatz up with this? I can not duplicate it either. That is the puzzle what if I want to do this again? Catfish says he just moved at the speed of light into focus . … super dog. Maybe he can become one with the Sony.
I am confused easily. DUH
Yep, the lower number=wider aperture thing was the most confusing part to me about photography, bar none. I still have to stop and think about it.
Here’s a suggestion: Put the camera in auto mode and take some photos in different light situations. Then look at the exposure data for them to see what the camera thought was the right settings. Sometimes it’ll be the same that you might’ve used, sometimes not.
I found it easiest to learn the camera one setting at a time; that is, first I would use the shutter priority settings because it was easiest for me to think in terms of shutter speeds. It meant a lot of dark photos for awhile, but over time I learned what light would allow what shutter speeds. Then I switched to aperture priority, etc. Then spot metering vs. overall metering. One feature at a time. After awhile your fingers get used to what they need to do to get the right picture.
My Nikon took over a year to really learn. The key is that if there’s a photo you really don’t want to miss, flip it over to auto and take the darn thing. Don’t even blink. Just do it. You’ll figure out how to get it tweaked yourself later, but it sucks to be saying, shoot, the one that got away!
K