Here Comes the Second Batch!

            Last time, I left off talking about some of the terms that are seen on the specifications of DSLRs when you buy them. Those included image stabilization, ISO, live view and megapixels. So now I am going to go ahead and cover the rest of them.

The term that I would like to cover first is dynamic range, since it’s probably the most complicated one of all that I will be talking about in this entry. Every single photo that you take includes shadows and highlights. There are a few basic elements that govern the appearance of shadows and highlights in your photos.  Shadows and highlights become more or less apparent depending upon the level of contrast in the scene. The level of contrast is determined by the quality of light. Bright sources of light create a lot of contrast while muted sources of light generate less contrast Light that creates strong contrast is also called hard light while low contrast light is called soft light. Hard light creates dark shadows and very bright highlights while soft light makes the shadows and highlights more balanced.

When you're looking at a scene where there's a lot of contrast your eyes are able to see details in both the shadows and highlights. A digital SLR camera can't since they have a limited dynamic range. Since an SLR camera can't capture the entire dynamic range, it has to choose between one of two options. They can either preserve detail in the shadows, over exposing the highlights making the image appear white, or preserve detail in the highlights and under expose the shadows making them appear black.

To fix this, there are several new digital SLR cameras that include enhanced dynamic range. With this, there are two different methods that DSLRs can use to improve the appearance of images with extreme contrast. Make the highlights bright, but prevent them from going to pure white, which helps retain some detail, or expose for highlights, making the shadows dark and then increase the brightness of just the shadows to balance the image. Different brands have different names for this. For Canon and Nikon, it’s called "highlight tone priority" and D-lighting respectively.

Next up is continuous drive. A continuous drive is geared towards action photographers because they need DSLR cameras with a high continuous photo speed and buffer. This is because they know that a fraction of a second is the difference from a pretty good photo and one that is downright exceptional. When you're dealing with fractions of a second, you need a camera that is crazy fast. The two key indicators of the speed of a digital SLR camera are its continuous photo speed and buffer. Every digital SLR camera has a mode where you can take rapid consecutive photos. All you have to do is hold down the camera's shutter release button, and the camera will keep snapping the photos off one by one. Continuous photo speed is the number of photos a camera can take in one second. Specification sheets will often list the continuous photo speed of an SLR in frames per second or FPS, which is equivalent to photos per second. This measurement makes it easy to tell if one camera is faster than another. If one camera has a speed of 5fps while another has a speed of 9fps, the 9fps camera can take more consecutive photos in less time. 

An HDSLR is a single camera that can capture both still images and HD video. In 2008, the HDSLR did not even exist. Digital SLR cameras were exceptional at taking still photos, but not a single one could be used to capture a motion picture. All that changed at the end of 2008 with the release of the Nikon D90, the first digital SLR that could capture both stills and video. After that first offering, the race was on: every other camera company had to produce something similar in order to stay "current". But some new term was required to describe these cameras: they weren't really simple digital SLRs anymore, nor were they video cameras (since you can't change out the lens on most consumer video cameras). I might go into more detail about this in the future since digital videography is something different topic from photography. 

Now to end with something simple, I want to talk briefly about auto focus. Nearly all DSLRs come with autofocus. In autofocus mode the DSLR will automatically focus on the subject in the center of the viewfinder (although many DSLRs allow you to select other areas to focus on too). 

Auto Focus Points

This is done by pressing the DSLR's shutter release button halfway down and when the subject is in focus, just press the button all the way to take the shot. If your camera has the continuous autofocus (AF) mode it will try keep the subject in focus without you having to press the shutter release button. Autofocus systems work best in bright conditions where the subject is in sharp contrast to its background.
            There you have it! Those are most of the terms you should try to familiarize yourself with when you choose your camera. There are a few that I missed but those aren’t as important to know as of now and will definitely be covered as I get into more detail about the different types of photography and methods. So in the meantime I hope you found this useful and happy shooting!

DSLR Terms

            In the last post, I talked about what to take into consideration when you are choosing your camera. One of the things that you should do before doing so is to learn some SLR terms. Even though this is largely a quick overview of the terms, I am going to be splitting this up into two parts as there is a lot of ground to cover and if you would like a more detailed description of a specific one, just let me know. With that said, let’s get started!         

The first one that I want to talk about is megapixels. Digital cameras capture images as pixel elements, called pixels.  To put it simply, a megapixel is equal to one million pixels. Digital images are made up of thousands of these really small picture elements. The more pixels there are, the higher the image resolution is. Resolution is related to the print size of the photo and the amount of detail an image has when it is seen on a computer at its full size. And as I said before, the more megapixels a camera has does not necessarily mean the better a camera is. Megapixels drive up the cost so if you plan on printing small photos, you are better off with one that has fewer megapixels.

Next up is ISO and noise. Increasing the ISO setting lets you take clear photos in dim light without having to use a flash, but it also degrades the image quality. An increase in ISO also causes an increase in image noise. When I say noise, I don’t mean by what’s going on in a frat party. What I mean is visual noise. Image noise comes from the use of a high ISO setting on your digital SLR camera. It is also often called grain as it gives a grainy effect to your photos. When a photo has image noise, the areas of color that should look smooth have a speckled appearance. Newer DSLR camera models are getting better and better at suppressing noise even at high ISO settings.

Third is dust control.  Dust control is a feature on DSLR cameras that wasn’t introduced until sometime during the year 2008 and has been a popular feature on newer camera models. The reason for having this feature is because one of the key differences between digital SLR and compact digital cameras is that you can remove the lens of an SLR. However, every time you take the lens off your DSLR, you're exposing the inside of the camera and the digital sensor to dust contamination. Dust in your home won't cause a lot of problems, but dust on your sensor appears as little black spots on every photo you take and dust control systems attempt to prevent this.

Next is live view. A live view LCD on a digital SLR camera lets you preview the photo you're about to take using the large LCD on the back of the camera. This provides you with a second way of composing your photos. The first involves looking through the viewfinder which is the eyepiece of the camera. A live view LCD is great for people who don't want to be limited to viewfinder composition, and enjoy taking photos from the hip, high up, or from odd angles. The continuous image displayed on the LCD helps you ensure that you're getting the composition right, even when your eye isn't pressed to the viewfinder.

The last thing I want to cover briefly is image stabilization. There are two types of stabilization. One that's included inside the camera and one that's inside the lens. Regardless of the type, stabilization helps get rid blur in your photos caused by camera shake. It helps you take clearer photos of non-moving subjects in dim light when you're not using the flash, photos when the camera is moving around a lot, and photos when using lenses with long focal lengths. However, it does not help when you're trying to capture photos of fast-moving subjects as a fast shutter speed will be needed.

I hope this gives you an idea of what some of these terms mean. Next time I will be talking about dynamic range, HDSLR, autofocus, and continuous drive. Until then, if you have any questions feel free to ask.

Choosing Your DSLR

Digital SLR (Single Lens Reflex) cameras are the choice for professional and amateur photographers in that they offer a large selection of lenses and are much more versatile than many point-and-shoot digital cameras. The image quality of an SLR camera is also much greater as they are more sophisticated than point-and-shoot cameras. When selecting a D-SLR, there are a few things that you should consider before doing so, but with new models being introduced each year, it is getting more difficult to choose which one to get as it's getting harder to tell them all apart.  This leads to the question that some of you asked me earlier on: which DSLR camera should I buy?

That was also one of the first things I asked myself too. My answer to that question would have to be this: the camera that I recommend that you should get is the one that will help you take the type of photos that you enjoy most. To put it simply, find the camera that is best suited for YOU. Take a second and imagine that you are buying a bike. You go out and buy a beautiful looking high-end road racing bike since it's on sale, but what you really love is going off the road in a muddy terrain. The bike isn’t going to work very well. The same thing can happen when you buy a camera. All DSLRs on the market today are very similar, and they are all capable of taking great photos. So once you know what type of photos you are planning to take, it will help narrow down your choices of which cameras to buy.

Next thing you should take into consideration before buying a camera is the kind of features you want in a camera to fit your photography needs. But before you do that, you need to understand some photography terms. If someone were to ask you what a DSLR is, would you be able to answer them? Do you know what all of these digital SLR terms mean: megapixels, anti-shake, ISO, buffer, aperture, shutter speed and metering mode? You should know before you start shopping for a camera. When you understand these terms you'll be able to find a camera with all of the features that you need, with none of the extras that you probably won’t.

After deciding on the type of photography you want to take and the features that you want on a camera, it’s time to actually choose a camera. In my opinion this may be one of the easier things to do since your mind is set on what you want to photograph. There are several ways that you can go on about this. First thing you can do is to evaluate camera specifications and features. For example, if you want to take night shots, you may want a camera that has a large ISO range with low noise at higher ISOs.  Or in the case that you think that you may want to print out large images of your photos, you may want a camera with a lot of megapixels. You can usually find camera specifications on the websites of the camera manufacturer.

A second approach could be comparing cameras side by side so that you can set the cameras apart from each other since many cameras include features that are very similar to one another. This is especially helpful when you have narrowed your camera search down to about two or three cameras, but are not able to decide on which one to get. You may want to cross examine cameras from different manufacturers that are always competing with each other such as Nikon and Canon, compare the features of different, or similar models, or even compare cameras by the date that they were released into the market to see if the upgrades, if any, may interest you.

Lastly, what you can also do is read guides or reviews on specific cameras. There are many camera guides floating around and they are usually in depth, which brings us back to my previous point that you should try to understand the jargon of photography. This is useful in trying to determine the camera that you may want because it gives you insight into people who have used the cameras before along with sample photos to give you an idea of the quality of the photos that can be taken.

The fourth and final thing to take into consideration before buying the camera is the price. I know that this may sound like a no-brainer but when it comes to DSLR cameras, there is a lot of variation on the pricing. Going back to the importance of taking camera specifications into consideration, a lot of the price difference is related to the number of megapixels a camera has, so it's important to figure out just how many you really need before deciding on your camera. Other "special features" can also bring up the price of the cameras so once again you should take that into consideration, or your camera is going to become a very expensive paperweight. Also, anything that was recently released is going to cost far more than a camera available last year. With that said DSLR cameras are comparable to any other type of technology such as computers and cars in the sense that their value starts to decrease right after you buy them, but that shouldn’t matter since you would have found the camera with everything you needed to begin with.

As a quick overview there are four main steps to take when considering what camera model to buy. First, decide on the type of photography you want to do. This helps you decide on the features that you will need. When you have the features down, you can begin comparing cameras looking at those specific features. Finally, when it’s time to compare prices of the different cameras, instead of comparing the price of every single camera that is being sold out there, you are just comparing the prices between the cameras that you know you want.

 I really hope this helped you on the approach of buying a camera. I am aware that I didn’t give any specific recommendations of what camera you should buy, but I am not in the position to do so simply because I haven’t had the opportunity to use a wide range of cameras yet to have any real input. However, I am happy to answer any questions you may have relating to finding a suitable camera for you.