Julie's Web Journal

Read the manual. That sounds like a no-brainer, but you should spend time with the instructions and learn how the various settings work

Practice. Experiment with the settings on your camera. The wonderful thing about digital cameras is that you can see the results of your photograph immediately, rather than wait for someone to process the prints. (The other wonderful thing is that you can delete your mistakes!) Shoot the same scene using different settings. You may want to write down the settings for each shot for reference.

Steady as she goes. Point-and-shoot cameras are small, and as such it's very easy to wiggle the camera as you press the shutter, especially under low-light conditions. Brace your elbow against something if this is an ongoing problem. When you're shooting at night, use a tripod or set the camera on a steady surface and use the timer. Press the shutter release, let go of the camera, and let the timer fire the shutter. You'll find that you get much better pictures – especially at night.

To flash or not to flash. Learn the settings on your flash and learn how to turn it off. There are times (especially indoors) when you don't want the flash to fire because it may bother others. Here's an extra tip: With some cameras, using the flash will slow the shutter speed down a bit. Place some black electrical tape over the flash. You'll get a slower shutter speed (which means more light hits the sensor) but without that annoying flash. This is something you should experiment with in advance, and it's probably a good idea to use the tripod or the timer trick mentioned above as it's more difficult to hold any type of camera steady at lower shutter speeds. There are also other tricks you can try, such as placing a little gauze over your flash to diffuse the light. Again, this is something you'll want to experiment with. Depending on your conditions and your camera, you may or may not be happy with the results. Also remember that your flash can only throw light a certain distance. If you're in the nosebleed seats at a concert your flash won't light the stage. You'll only succeed in lighting up the backs of heads in the few rows ahead of you and annoying the heck out of those around you.

Get to know your image editing program. Inexpensive (or free) programs will allow you to make basic adjustments to brightness, contrast and color in your pictures. Even back in the days when we shot dinosaurs on Tri-X film there was rarely a picture that could be printed "as is" from a negative. I can't tell you the hours I would spend in the darkroom, trying to get the contrast or exposure right on a print. And there was no undo button on the enlarger!

Watch your focus. Some point-and-shoot cameras will autofocus, while some have a fixed focus. If yours will autofocus, it will generally do that when you press the shutter button halfway down. Experiment with focusing on different elements in a scene. You should also experiment and see how close you can get to a subject before you lose focus. You may not be able to tell in the viewfinder. This is a good thing to know before you try getting any closeup shots. Your camera may have a macro mode, which is for taking closeup pictures. Learn how to use it.

Sometimes blurry is good. If you're shooting someone or something in motion (say a car or cyclist or someone running), follow the subject for a bit and continue panning as you hit the shutter release. This is another thing that takes practice, but when you get good at it you can keep the subject sharp and blur the background. Or, keep the camera steady if you want to blur the subject but keep the background in sharp focus.

The one thing I can't say enough is to experiment. It doesn't cost you anything but some time and battery power, but the more you work at it, the better you'll get. You WILL take a lot of lousy shots in your quest for the good picture. Don't let that deter you.

Tags: Photography