Last week, we learned about the Program AE, shutter speed, aperture and manual settings. On my camera, they’re shown as P, Tv, Av and M. Basically, we were shown how to play around with white balance, and control how much light comes into the shot or how fast the shot is taken (he used the example of a helicopter… “Do you want a static looking image where it the blades are perfectly visible, as if it’s falling out of the sky? Or do you want a slight blur to show they’re moving?”. I’m not ready to go full-manual yet, but it’s to know I at least have the lingo down!
Our assignment this week was to play with white balance in whichever settings we chose between the four mentioned above. I went with the easy P setting, and let the camera choose my shutter speed and aperture setting. I tried to shoot my very active baby and got a bunch of half-blurred shots. I also wanted to see how other colours would look (instead of just white)… So I put a few bright and high contrast toys together and told them to smile.
So, my camera offers 8 different options -well, 7 if you don’t count Custom: Auto, Day Light, Cloudy, Tungsten, Fluorescent, Fluorescent H and Flash. Depending where you’re shooting, some options are best (obviously). In my case, in my livingroom, at night, under a warm light (slightly yellow) these options are the difference between a clean bus, rosy piggy and happy panda:
(shot with the Tungsten setting)
…and a vintage bus, pig-from-the-land-of-Cheetos and jaundiced panda:
(shot with the Cloudy setting)
I also learned that shots taken in these non-presets are analyzed by my camera, who then suggests the best cropping options for a general shot or a close up! Thanks, camera, it’s awesome to know you got my back! ❤
Picture Perfect 