Is anyone willing to...

give me a short list of manual settings? If not, I'll understand. The thing is, I've never used them, and my FZ7 has shipped. I've checked out library books and read through them, but all the information is so confusing, and scattered. What I'd like is a list of aperture, F-stop, etc. numbers' meanings and when you use a high f-stop, etc. I'd like to print it out on a card, so I could just get started trying the settings. Thanks.

First off:

Aperture: This is the amount of light the camera's lens lets in. It's measured in F-stops, with a lower number meaning more light and a higher number meaning less light. A lower number, which gives a brighter picture, also gives you a shallower Depth of Field (more on this next). A higher number gives you a deeper depth of field.

Before we go on, depth of field: This is the amount of area which is in focus in your photograph. Example here:



Okay, so back to aperture: That's about all you need to know. However, note that on the vast majority of cameras, the highest aperture (eg F 2.8) is only available at the camera's wide angle, when no optical zoom is in use. The highest aperture will decrease slightly as you use the zoom. On the F7 I believe that at full telephoto (optical zoom) the highest aperture decreases to F 3.3.

So not a huge difference.

You only mentioned aperture in your post, but if you want to know about things like white balance and shutter speed do not hesitate to ask.

On the depth of field thing, note that the depth of field in the picture I linked you to is EXTREMELY shallow.

I've realised you DID mention other manual settings, sorry. Thankfully, they're generally a lot simpler than aperture, so if you got that then this should be a breeze.

Shutter speed: Rather easy. This is the amount of time the camera's lens takes the picture for. Your F7 has a range of 60 seconds to 1/2000 seconds. Taking, for example, sports shots at a shutter speed of 1/5 second is not a good idea - you'll see a lot of blurring. Take a look at this Wikipedia article here, it's rather good:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shutter_speed

Thank you, and yes, I need WB, etc. info. I'd like a very, very basic primer that I could print to carry. Then, I would have a starting point.

wishkc said:

Thank you, and yes, I need WB, etc. info. I'd like a very, very
basic primer that I could print to carry. Then, I would have a
starting point.

Click to expand...

Try here:
http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials.htm
--
Telecorder (Dave)
FZee5/FZee30+RD-S+OlyTC1.7X
Dee50+Nikkor18-70DX+Tam70-300L+BIGMA 50-500 EX HSM

on exposure, done by one of the forum members that I found helpful.
--
cheers
Rafael (FZ30)
http://rafael.zenfolio.com/ (referral code on my page)

so I didn't understand what you were referring to.

already have understanding of the program mode, then shutter and aperture priority modes. Manual is just the normal extension of those modes in being able now to decide what would you prioritize at the same time - speed or lens opening. I guess people are in a hurry too much to learn/understand the basics.
cheers,
gil
--
**************
100% hand held. 100% jpg.
http://art4less.smugmug.com

No printed info but a good discussion of what the setting dos for exposure.

--
cheers
Rafael (FZ30)
http://rafael.zenfolio.com/ (referral code on my page)

Thanks to everyone for your comments. I'm getting the feeling that I should do as Gil suggested, and just start with shutter or aperture priority. Then get into manual settings later.

Rafael, I like #12 in Your Favorites very much!! And, others, of course.