Although photography's an expressive art form with limitless creative potential, a bit of a scientific approach can make life easier - and certainly less frustrating. By developping a systematic way of adjusting camera settings, you will ensure that you don't make schoolboy errors, such as using a wide camera sperture for photographing a scenic, or leaving the ISO set on 1600 when you are shooting a portrait on a clear, sunny day.
The sooner the technical side of photography becomes routine and second nature, the sooner you can start focusing on the subject, the composition and "the moment". It is always best to develop a set way of working, as it will allow you to react quickly and make fast changes to your camera settings in order to capture a fleeting moment prefectly.
We'd recommend you start by creating a default setting for your camera - a kind of "sleep" mode that, if you fired the camera up quickly to grab a shot, you know exactly from what point you will be making adjustments. For instance, some photographers like using camera Aperture Priority, with the aperture set at its widest setting, combined with ISO 200, pattern metering, continuous drive and center focus point with single-shot focus. From this camera set-up it would be easy to add exposure compensation or quickly switch to continuous focus to capture a moving subject. Just settle on a camera default set-up that's right for you and your style of photography.
For those time when you've got more breathing space to consider a camera shot, start being a thinking photographer and follow the process we've outlined her.......
4 Steps to Getting the Camera Shot.......
1. White Balance
Once you have found the camera shot, framed it up and focused, set the White Balance according to the conditions. A correctly set White Balance will not only give you a misleading (or way-off) representation on the camera LCD, but it also affects the exposure histogram. If you want to see this - take a RAW shot into Photoshop Elements and adjust the White Balance. Watch the histogram move.
2. ISO
The golden rule : keep the camera ISO as low as possible for the best quality results. As you increase ISO, so you increase noise in a camera shot, expecially if you underexpose it and have to "push" the exposure back up in software. The Nikon D3's camera performance at high ISOs is incredible, but we'd use an ISO of 100-400 on most DSLRs.
3. Shooting Mode
What's the most important variable in a camera shot? Is the depth of field important? In which case, use camera Aperture Priority and dial in a small aperture. Is freezing action or adding blur an essential requirement? Switch to camera Shutter Priority. If you have got the time, use Manual mode.
4. Exposure
Finally, choose the camera metering pattern to suit the subject and lighting and make any compensation adjustments to account for highlights/shadows. Make sure you reset any camera adjustments once you have got the shot in the bag.