Yet another trip to Vasona Lake County Park in Los Gatos, CA. Trying to work on my composition and this was one of them. Lighting is blown in places.
Camera Info
Device: Nikon D3100
Lens: VR 70-300mm f/4-5.6G
Focal Length: 70mm
Focus Mode: AF-A
AF-Area Mode: Auto
VR: ON
AF Fine Tune:
Exposure
Aperture: f/4.5
Shutter Speed: 1/800s
Exposure Mode: Aperture Priority
Exposure Comp.: 0EV
Exposure Tuning:
Metering: Matrix
ISO Sensitivity: ISO 400
This photo was taken on top of Communication Hill a month ago. I tried my hand at editing in Lightroom 4 with this photo, never done any editing before outside of the ViewNX 2 software that came with my camera. Leveled the horizon, played with the colors a little and cropped out the freeway as well as the left side out.
Camera Info
Device: Nikon D3100
Lens: VR 70-300mm f/4-5.6G
Focal Length: 100mm
Focus Mode: AF-A
AF-Area Mode: Auto
VR: OFF
AF Fine Tune:
Exposure
Aperture: f/4.2
Shutter Speed: 1/125s
Scene Mode: Auto (Flash Off)
Exposure Comp.: 0EV
Exposure Tuning:
Metering: Matrix
ISO Sensitivity: Auto (ISO 500)
Taken at the San Jose Japanese Friendship Garden at 1:02pm. The single dead branch in a sea of green ones added some nice contrast against the aged wooden post.
Camera Info
Device: Nikon D3100
Lens: VR 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6G
Focal Length: 48mm
Focus Mode: AF-A
AF-Area Mode: Auto
VR: ON
AF Fine Tune:
Exposure
Aperture: f/5.3
Shutter Speed: 1/20s
Exposure Mode: Aperture Priority
Exposure Comp.: 0EV
Exposure Tuning:
Metering: Matrix
ISO Sensitivity: ISO 100
This set of books was one of the many reading materials suggested to me on thephotoforum.com for someone starting out in photography, looking for a refresher or moving from film to digital.
First off the author is an accomplished photographer but is more well known for his teaching abilities and books. Needless to say these books are extremely easy to understand and can been used with any digital camera although its examples are with both Nikon and Canon models. It is important that you read these books in order as the information builds on the basics learned in the previous. Scott flows information to you effortlessly making it very easy to take in and not feel overwhelmed by the sheer amount there is to know about each aspect he covers. The books are written in a tone as if he is there helping you with the task you are working on instead of shoving facts in your head.
The books start out with a lot about the language of photography, equipment, options of the DSLR cameras and how they all come together and work. It brakes down different situations of photography and explains what you need to think about and do to achieve the desired result in each photo you take.
Once you have the basics and are well rounded it dives into more details on different aspects such as landscape, composition, equipment use ect… As mentioned above its all about giving you little bits of information and then expanding on each later once you have a good understanding of it.
You can find the book set here on Amazon. A kindle version of the set is also available: http://www.amazon.com/Scott-Kelbys-Digital-Photography-Volumes/dp/0321678737/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1326126644&sr=8-2
A fourth book is in this series will be releasing at some point. Amazon doesn’t seem to have a date as of yet. I will be getting this when it comes out because I enjoyed these books so much.
A lucky profile picture I took of Wheatley my cat. This was taken indoors in horrible lighting but I really liked his posture and expression.
Camera Info
Device: Nikon D3100
Lens: VR 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6G
Focal Length: 55mm
Focus Mode: AF-A
AF-Area Mode: Auto
VR: ON
AF Fine Tune:
Exposure
Aperture: f/5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/60s
Exposure Mode: Aperture Priority
Exposure Comp.: 0EV
Exposure Tuning:
Metering: Matrix
ISO Sensitivity: ISO 200
Taken on top of Communication Hill in San Jose at 7:50 in the morning. The morning was cloudy and the winds kept moving the clouds which constantly changed the view. This was my first time using the Tamron 70-300MM F/4-5.6 lens.
Camera Info
Device: Nikon D3100
Lens: VR 70-300mm F/4-5.6G
Focal Length: 70mm
Focus Mode: AF-A
AF-Area Mode: Auto
VR: OFF
AF Fine Tune:
Exposure
Aperture: F/5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/500s
Scene Mode: Auto (Flash Off)
Exposure Comp.: 0EV
Exposure Tuning:
Metering: Matrix
ISO Sensitivity: Auto (ISO 220)
This was taken at home on Christmas morning of our cat Peanut. Was more just testing out a UV filter to see how it affected pictures. This is one with the UV filter on.
Camera Info
Device: Nikon D3100
Lens: VR 18-55mm F/3.5-5.6G
Focal Length: 34mm
Focus Mode: AF-A
AF-Area Mode: Auto
VR: ON
AF Fine Tune:
Exposure
Aperture: F/5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/60s
Exposure Mode: Aperture Priority
Exposure Comp.: 0EV
Exposure Tuning:
Metering: Matrix
ISO Sensitivity: ISO 400
Took another trip to Vasona Lake County Park in Los Gatos, CA. Wanted to try my hand at some berries I saw last time and get more of them in the shot. The exposure didn’t turn out as well as last time. Not sure if this one is a step forward or backwards.
Camera Info
Device: Nikon D3100
Lens: VR 18-55mm F/3.5-5.6G
Focal Length: 35mm
Focus Mode: Manual
AF-Area Mode: Single
VR: ON
AF Fine Tune:
Exposure
Aperture: F/11
Shutter Speed: 1/200s
Exposure Mode: Shutter Priority
Exposure Comp.: 0EV
Exposure Tuning:
Metering: Matrix
ISO Sensitivity: ISO 400
Jumping into photography with a DSLR camera with minimal to no knowledge about photography in general can be very daunting. There are lots of buttons and settings on these camera’s and although they do take very nice pictures in Auto mode its a shame to not use the camera to its full potential. All the buttons and nobs along with setting values like Aperture, Shutter Speed and ISO can be hard to wrap your head around and frustrate you to no end without a clear explanation.
Nikon D3100 for Dummies explains all this in easy to understand layman’s terms that doesn’t require any previous knowledge of photography. The book starts off very basic explaining how to attach a lens to the camera body and going through what each button is called and its basic function. Then it moves to the menus and options that you can access with the camera through its screen. It continues like this with the more basic settings until you are shooting pictures and feeling comfortable with the automatic settings.
With a lot of details and examples the book gradually explains to you semi automatic and then manual shooting. Since everything is given to you in bite sized pieces a little at a time building on top of the core knowledge you have already gained, learning feels very natural and is easy to understand. In the case of aperture, shutter speed and ISO all three of these options control the way light hits the sensor of the DSLR camera. These three values need to be balanced correctly to achieve great results. The author explains this and how each one should be used in a very easy to grasp way that I had not been able to find anywhere else. This can be one of the hardest things to grasp when moving away from taking snapshots to actual pictures.
The book then continues with all the photo editing you can do within the camera itself. This I was less interested in as I will be doing most of my photo editing on the computer, not the camera. But I was astounded at how much editing the camera is capable of doing on its own.
Conclusion:
Nikon D3100 for Dummies flows very well and is clearly designed for someone who is new to photography and DSLR cameras. If you just got your D3100 and dont know too much about photography this should be your first step to getting started.
This picture was taken at Monterey CA at 12/3/2011 9:12:04 PM PST. This was down the street from the aquarium while I was waiting for some friends to get done shopping in some stores.
Camera Info
Device: Nikon D3100
Lens: VR 18-55mm F/3.5-5.6G
Focal Length: 35mm
Focus Mode: Manual
AF-Area Mode: Single
VR: ON
AF Fine Tune:
Exposure
Aperture: F/7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/200s
Scene Mode: Auto
Exposure Comp.: 0EV
Exposure Tuning:
Metering: Matrix
ISO Sensitivity: Auto (ISO 100)