Welcome back. We are on camera set up number four and we
call this time-timing and time-saving. So here we are.
As you shop for your camera,
you may notice in some of the advertisements something called burst rate,
B U R S T R A T E,
as a camera feature that the manufacturers are boasting about.
And that burst rate can be anywhere from three frames per second
to 12 frames per second. Sometimes more.
That burst rate relates to what we call continuous setting.
And that continuous setting is continuous shooting.
What it means is that every time you press the shutter release button down and hold it,
the camera will just keep shooting.
Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang.
You can look for the total number of frames
that the camera is capable of shooting in one burst,
beyond that one second amount.
Now with some cameras,
with one push of the button,
you can shoot maybe five or 10 pictures and that's it.
With more expensive cameras, more options,
you can shoot perhaps up to 200 at one time.
In ordinary circumstances of course,
we're going to use the single shooting or single setting.
And all camera manufacturers,
most of them, tend to use the same symbols for that.
If you like fast shooting,
in the continuous mode,
you are going to want to get yourself some high speed and high capacity memory cards.
UHS is a designation for memory cards that you should be aware of.
It refers to ultra high speed.
And that high speed means,
how fast can the memory card read the information coming from the camera.
The other set of letters you'll want to know about is SDXC.
And SDXC stands for an SD card essentially that has extra capacity.
These are the maximum capacity cards currently available.
Another thing we're going to want to work on in setting up our camera is bracketing.
Do we want our camera to bracket or not?
This is a choice that you have to make going into your functions and menus.
It's probably going to be called bracketing in your camera,
as you know I'm using Canon camera language and
Canon camera menus and functions to explain this theory or these principles to you.
But your camera manufacturer might have different words for them.
It doesn't matter, it's the same thing.
With bracketing, the camera is going to take
three pictures every time you press the button.
And this is for single shooting.
It'll take one photograph that's normal exposure,
one that's a little bit more exposure in other words overexposed,
and one that's a little bit less exposed in other words underexposed.
You can also find cameras that have the capability of shooting what we call HDR.
And with HDR, a number of photographs are taken all at
once and then combined into one picture. This is different.
This is giving you three individual files,
each of which will have slightly different exposure.
Another set up task that you want to take a look at is the self-timer.
Now, self-timer options can be limited to one setting on some cameras.
The less expensive ones might just give you a five second or 10 second option.
Others you can set maybe two seconds or 10 seconds,
you might have a variety of two or three options.
And then in some other cameras you got it,
they're a little bit more expensive,
you can set your own number.
You can say, oh I want you to wait 30 seconds before the shutter goes off.
And that equals dollars.
This is a useful tool not only for when you want to be in the picture,
but it's also very useful when you want to avoid camera shake.
I'll very often have my camera on a tripod to try to
avoid having any movement occur with a long shutter speed.
But when I press the shutter release button sometimes my hand
will shake the camera and it kind of voids the purpose of having a tripod.
So I often will use the self-timer
with the camera on a tripod even when I'm not in the picture.
Another aspect you'll want to address is continuous numbering.
Now, we're getting into the aspect here where you'd say,
well what does this have to do with time.
It doesn't have so much to do with time in the camera,
it has to do with your time as a human being.
If you don't have your camera set on continuous file numbering,
every time you take your memory card out and put it back in, guess what?
The number for that first picture is going to be 0001.
And you will end up with a lot of 0001 pictures.
As opposed to the smart person, I think,
setting their camera on continuous numbering and having
each and every individual picture up to probably 10,000 have it's own number.
Power saving. Well, this again has something to do with
time in your life rather than time in the camera per se.
But it's something that I emphasize in
each and every class that I teach right in the first lecture.
There are certain settings that will save battery power and,
as a general rule,
camera manufacturers set up the camera so that right out of the box,
the camera is going to save battery power for you.
That's very nice of them.
It's nice that they're thinking of us,
but I'm going to recommend since that you are all good students
and that all of you will never leave
the house without an extra set of batteries for your camera,
that you're going to change those settings to make your life happier.
Review time means the amount of time the picture will
appear on the rear LCD screen after exposure.
There are very few things that annoy me more than when the camera
decides after 10 seconds that I have seen enough of my own picture when I have not.
So if you'll set the function or menu setting for your camera on the hold setting,
the picture will stay on the screen until you decide to turn it off.
And the simple way to turn it off is just lightly touch the shutter release button.
Bingo, your screen will disappear.
Auto power off, well that's another annoyance that can waste your time.
The camera will simply decide if you've got this set to be on,
the camera will decide to shut itself
off if you haven't used it for a certain period of time.
Now, when I'm walking around with my camera,
looking at the world and trying to find possibilities to photograph,
it's quite likely that I'm not going to be handling that camera every five seconds.
There's nothing more frustrating than to see something you want to
photograph pick your camera up and have it be off.
So my advice to you, auto power off.
Here's one more camera setting that's going to save you
time and probably keep you from crying a lot.
There's a setting on your camera called shoot without card or something like that.
And if this is set to on,
that means that the camera will operate perfectly.
It'll focus, it'll change shutter speeds,
you can change from manual to auto exposure, anything you want.
It'll even show you a picture on the rear screen of
the camera after you make an exposure. But guess what?
Nothing is being recorded if you don't have a card in the camera.
So I always turn this thing off,
almost like the first thing I do when I get a new camera.
And I recommend that you do too.