How to Use Digital Camera ?

FOCUS!!!

And how to minimize the delay between your pressing the button and the camera actually taking the picture from the cheapest point-and-shoots to the most advanced professional SLRs, cameras usually are very good at getting the subject in focus automatically.

Manual focus is a feature on my compact cameras (Panasonic FZ, Canon S90) and on the lenses of my SLRs, but I use it very rarely. Sometimes the camera has trouble focusing when the light is very low and/or in macro situations (shooting pictures of very small things), but even in those instances, the camera is usually very good at getting the subject in focus.

What the camera may or may not be good at is deciding what the subject IS. The problem is, a lot of times you want to compose a picture in an interesting way, where the thing that has to be most sharply in focus is not at the center. For example, a picture of a person with something in the background is often more interesting if the person is off to the side rather than smack dab in the middle. But the problem is, the camera usually wants to focus on what’s in the middle. Even SLRs. If you just compose the picture and then press the button, the person (or whatever is the important thing that really should be most sharply focused will be out of focus).

The solution to this is simple. First, point the camera straight at the person (or at the thing that should be sharply in focus). Then, half-press the shutter button. The camera will focus on the person (or whatever). When the camera is focused, it will usually give you a little green light or a beep or something. Now, keep that button half-pressed, because if you take your finger off the camera will just re-focus when you press the button again. Now, re-compose the picture (point the camera in a slightly different direction so that the person is now a little off to the side). And NOW press the button the rest of the way down.

This kind of technique is illustrated below:

Above, a photographer is about to take a picture. Say the photographer wants to compose a shot like this, with the people kinda off to the side instead of at the middle. Problem is since the people are not near the middle, and the area near the middle of the picture is far away, the camera thinks it ought to focus on the far-away stuff, and then the people (who are NOT far away) are out of focus. (The classic example of this would have one person at either side of the shot, and some background visible BETWEEN them rather than off to the side, but I could not find a good one like that among my pictures).

The solution? Point the camera at the people...

 


 ...now half-click the button (the people will come into focus, and when the camera is "locked" this way, it will give you a signal, like a beep, or like the display turning green, or something):

Now, with your finger still on the button, recompose the shot (move the camera so it points the way you originally wanted it, with the people off to the side) and finish pressing th button the rest of the way:

“Half pressing” the button might sound weird, but if you press you camera’s button slowly and feel for it, you’ll feel a spot about halfway down that you can easily hold. So press the button that much to set the focus first, and then actually take the picture.

One last thing about this: Most of the delay between pressing the button and hearing the camera take the picture comes from focusing. If your camera is pre-focused (button is half-pressed, or camera is in manual focus mode), then there will be much less of a delay between pressing the button and taking the picture. Therefore, you should have that button half-pressed in advance if your picture is going to capture a precise moment in time. 

For example, if you’re taking a picture of a tennis player and you want the picture to be of the moment they are swinging the racket over their head during a serve, or at the moment the ball is in contact with the racket, then you need for there to be a small delay from when you press the button to when the picture is taken. Here's what you do: Point your camera at the tennis player and half-press the button, a good couple of seconds (at least) before the moment you want to capture.

 The camera will have time to focus. As I said earlier, when the camera is focused, it will usually give you a little green light or a beep or something. You then know that, when you press the button, the picture will be taken with minimal delay. So keep the button half-pressed, and then when that moment comes, press the button the rest of the way, and watch it as your camera takes the picture very fast indeed. Maybe not quite SLR-fast, but much faster than if you started pressing the button immediately before you wanted the shot.