Why did this landscape photo of the Golden Gate Bridge, taken in Manual -autopriority mode, turn out so much better than others I’ve taken elsewhere? Is it the subject, the light, time of day?
After reading yesterday about the relationship (trade-off) between depth of field and sharpness, I’m going to wager to say it’s because the aperature wasn’t cranked way down. The article I read yesterday stated the optimum sharpness for a lens is usually between two and four stops below the minimum aperature (largest F-stop).
If you’re shooting a Nikon D40x (or D40x), remember that each click of the command dial is 1/3-stop, not one complete stop. This applies to shutter speed, aperature and exposure compensation. On later models, the incrementation can be changed in the main menu from one-third to one-half and full-stops.
If this feature were available on the D40x, I’m pretty sure when shooting landscape shots, I’d set shutter and aperature to full-stops and then put the exposure compensation on 1/3 stops. That being said, I’d leave ISO on manual using the progamable function button to change selections.
The picture controls under the Shooting Menu / Optimize Image come next. Using the Custom option, I’d crank up the Saturation for nearly all shots; up the contrast for most shots; and, with respect to sharpness - if the subject is sharp, enhance sharpness - if the subject is soft, decrease the sharpness to normal.
Lots of these things of course can be done post-processing on the computer in Photoshop and elsewhere. I guess I’m a purest who thinks a the life cycle of a great photo begins with preparation.
- Photo talk 1 (slideshare.net)
- the scale of things (chromasia.com)
- Mastering the Nikon D3000 (oreilly.com)
