First few pictures with D40

I bought my first slr last week having never used one before. It is completely different to my little canon point and shoot which I loved and grew to know inside out. At the moment we are still having a bit of a love hate relationship as some of you may know if you read the beginners questions. At first I thought the photos looked horrible on my monitor, they didn't look natrual, colours were horrible and they just didnt look right. I have since looked at them on my works computer and sisters laptop and what a difference! They look how i imagined they should, not all are perfect but they do look better to some of my canons. I've since adjusted my monitor and its made a bit of a difference but they still don't look as good as laptop.

Here are some of my pictures





















One of the problems i am having is and i'm wondering if anyone can offer any advice. On dull days I am still able to get clear pictures of my dog and flowers but having big problems with random pictures or landscapes (boring ones with not much there) They are all very dark, and if there is an object in distance of shot it turns out dark. I've tried upping the iso high, using aperture, and upping exposure to +0.7. I thought iso 800 seemed abit high when its just a bit dull, as my old camera would have managed on auto. The results aren't consisted with different settings, they are just very dark. For some the best results have been iso 800 and exposure +0.7. Heres an example, but not one of the worse.





Thanks, Sarah

Shutter speed, aperture size, ISO, and exposure compensation ALL affect exposure.

I'd suggest watching all 7 of these, I found them quite helpful:

http://vimeo.com/6571932

Keep in mind that your camera has 3 different metering modes. Learning how and when to use each is a HUGE key to nailing exposure almost every time, the FIRST time. Other than that, once you've got the basics down with regards to shutter speed and aperture (depth of field), start by taking a test shot, evaluating of the LCD, then adjusting using the exposure compensation. Works great, especially in matrix metering mode.

The thing to understand here is that your camera has a limited dynamic range, from dark to light. You camera's meter will try to make what you're metering off into middle gray (look up "the zone system").

You'll notice (in some of your posted pics) that when you've got the right exposure for the subject (dog or whatever) or the foreground, the sky becomes almost or totally white, and has no detail. Perhaps the sky WAS white, making for a very boring sky, so therefore should be a very small part of the image. Then, when you got the sky good, the big rock is dark.

This is very, very common. The camera can only record so much, from light to dark. The general rule for digital photography (as you'll see in the videos), is "expose for the mid-tones, check the high's". That's because it's easier to recover lost shadow detail, than it is to recover blown highlights (or many time impossible), in post-processing.

Keep you chin up, and shoot more, observing the basic "rules" for exposure. Get some got post-processing software, and learn how to use it. And most of all, HAVE FUN!!!

PS - your D40 is a MUCH better camera than any point and click.

Your last picture can be easily improved by using the curves adjustment in post-processing. Boost the low and middle tones and tame the brights just a bit and it looks good, albeit the sky may not end up as ominous as it might have been at the time.

on a macbook they will look even better

--
Current gear: Nikon D700, Nikon D40, Panasonic ZS3, Olympus SW1030, Fuji F30

I like the composition of the first. I think that you have a good eye.
--
Bob

Have a D40 myself for about a year, with a lot of practice and the help of David Busch Digital Field Guide d40/D40X, I get some good results now.
Have lightened the shadows in your last shot Penny.
Enjoy your new camera.
http://www.pbase.com/bernard74/profile

Thanks, I definitely have a lot to learn on exposure. I have an understanding of what shutter speed and aperture do alone but don't quite understand how together they all effect exposure. I am just at the stage of playing around with different settings and seeing what results I like best, which is proving difficult as I see different results on my own monitor compared to my works and sisters laptop - the images look better on theirs. Some times the light fawn and grey around my dogs face are over exposed a little, so I need to learn to maybe down the exposure with -0.3 without it effecting the brightness of image. I just wish I knew whos monitor was producing the correct looking images.

I have noticed that with the sky, in a lot of my pictures it is rather blown out, its not helping much that since I got the camera we have had nothing buy overcast grey/bright white clouds.

Thanks all for the tips. I think I will buy that book and see if it helps, the manual is a bit vague in that it tell you how to change things but not a great detail on why or when.

I've read all the post and for me, the first one hit the nail on the head. Metering is one of the most important parts of photography. Basically we have three different types of metering. In a Nikon we have Matrix, center weighted and spot. Carefully look them up and study them so you will know how they work.I would recommend that you learn something on the zone system . Just Goggle it and read. God Bless.

What kind of dog is that?

She is a whippet and the most patient dog for getting her photos taken she just stands or lays there as I frantically change the settings and take lots of pictures!

1. Bear in mind that if shooting in P mode, upping ISO alone will not change the exposure as the camera will reduce shutter speed or aperture accordingly in order to maintain what "it" thinks is the best exposure.

2. You can adjust exposure by dialing in EV compensation in one of automatic modes (P,A,S, not sure if possible in green Auto) or going to full manual and playing with each of these parameters independently.

3. In your last shot, the island takes about 5% of the frame area. Do you expect the camera to expose for the tiny fraction fo the image? The sky is perfectly exposed and the camera has no way of knowing that the island is your main subject.

From my experience (Various Nikon, Canon and Pentax slr's) D40 has an excellent metering system. I don't think any camera would give you a higher hit rate. As with any camera some light conditions require user's override and this is where you need to understand exposure.

Cheers,

Al

Here is your last shot again, I've lighten the shadows.

Penny, were you in P mode. If so you selected f5.6. Did the D40 speed go to 10/2500 on its own? Possibly a slower speed would give better results. I have a D40 myself and rarely do I ever use the speeds you used in any pic you posted. I am just a novice myself and perhaps doing it all wrong myself.

I also use the David Busch book on D40 from Amazon. It's alot better than the manual that came with camera.
Have you done any RAW shots yet? I am trying to learn manual & Raw also.
I use Picassa 3 for post editing, it's free and does the job for me right now.
Regards,
Karen

To be honest at the moment I am just playing around with the settings. I have been using full auto and only adjusting the iso. P mode - normal and I don't adjust anything here with the dial only the iso and exposure these are the two modes I am using most along with sports and landscape. If I am honest I have so much to learn and don't really know what I am doing, I know bout ISO that lets more light into the lens but don't fully understand mixing all the different settings together. I think I will definitely need to get that book

Penny,

Not to be in disagreement with advice given above, but the real power of digital photography is in learning some post processing skills....

Yes, learning to expose correctly and even set picture styles is important, but no amount of futzing with the camera can do what 5 minutes of levels and curves adjustments and a little color adjustment can do in just about any of the major pieces of software you might consider.....

here is your "boring" landscape (dragged off the web no less) after a few simple tweeks in Photoshop.....nothing spectacular, but closer to what you might remember ... no ?

best

Fred

http://www.flickr.com/photos/fredmueller/4864474245/

Photos I like, Sarah. For your lens would be sufficient for photographing animals shutter speed 1/200. Smaller ISO. Dynamic range of D40 is very good. Adjust the composition of dog.

Stan
--
--------------
http://ssnet.cz