First trip with new camera, need help with editing basics

[Larry Grady]

I received some great advice on this forum for a big trip my wife and I went on for our 30 year anniversary. Based on advice from this board, I purchased a Nikon Z6iii w/ two z lenses, the 24-120 f/4 and the 14-30 f/4. I was very please with the camera and the lenses, they served me well for the 3 weeks we were gone.

I practiced a bit before leaving but quickly felt it had not been nearly enough once we were on our way. There was so much to learn once I was out in the wild. I ended up taking about 4k pictures. At least a quarter of them are bad exposures, out of focus, or just not well composed images... immediate garbage.

My view is that the two most important things when taking the usual still photos are:

1. Optimum exposure
2. Sharp focus.

As a beginner, maybe try the following:

1. Optimum exposure:
Per Google, the Z6iii only allows zebras in movie mode but not is still mode. That is a real bummer. However, it does allow the histogram overlay in the viewfinder (VF). If that's true, try the following:
..... a. Set the camera to P mode.
..... b. Enable the histogram overlay in the VF.
..... c. Frame the scene in the VF. Adjust exposure compensation so that the bottom right edge of the histogram mountains just touches the right side of the histogram display. (known as the ETTR method of setting exposure) This will give you the optimum exposures without blowing out the highlights.
..... d. Only do steps a and b once. Repeat step-c for every shot. This should result in optimum exposure for almost every shot.

2. Sharp focus:
..... a. Do not use auto focus.
..... b. Set the camera to use center point focus.
..... c. Set the focus square on the subject and half press the shutter button to lock focus. Recompose for the scene you want. Press the shutter so slowly that it surprises you when it trips. That should give your sharp focus on the subject you want.

Experiment with aperture and shutter priority modes as the situations require.

Hope this helps.

Going to give this a shot this weekend

 

[Larry Grady]

I'll check this out. He has a lightroom one as well, which is what I've been using.

 

[skyglider]

My view is that the two most important things when taking the usual still photos are:

1. Optimum exposure
2. Sharp focus.

As a beginner, maybe try the following:

1. Optimum exposure:
Per Google, the Z6iii only allows zebras in movie mode but not is still mode. That is a real bummer. However, it does allow the histogram overlay in the viewfinder (VF). If that's true, try the following:
..... a. Set the camera to P mode.
..... b. Enable the histogram overlay in the VF.
..... c. Frame the scene in the VF. Adjust exposure compensation so that the bottom right edge of the histogram mountains just touches the right side of the histogram display. (known as the ETTR method of setting exposure) This will give you the optimum exposures without blowing out the highlights.
..... d. Only do steps a and b once. Repeat step-c for every shot. This should result in optimum exposure for almost every shot.

2. Sharp focus:
..... a. Do not use auto focus.
..... b. Set the camera to use center point focus.
..... c. Set the focus square on the subject and half press the shutter button to lock focus. Recompose for the scene you want. Press the shutter so slowly that it surprises you when it trips. That should give your sharp focus on the subject you want.

Experiment with aperture and shutter priority modes as the situations require.

Hope this helps.

Going to give this a shot this weekend

Recommend resetting the camera via the menu first. That will reset any settings you may have set in the past. Then do steps 1 and 2 above.

FYI, one time I was experimenting with low light pictures in the evening. I did not reset my camera the next morning. Pictures I took that morning were using the high ISO setting that I had used the previous evening. Pictures were usable but not of optimum quality like they should have been. Learned my lesson to either reset settings I use to experiment immediately, or to reset the camera to defaults before shooting the next morning.

Also, if exposure compensation (EC) is not adjustable via a thumb/finger wheel, then check your camera's manual on how to assign EC to a thumb/finger wheel. That will make setting EC really fast in step 1c. ..... Fast exposure setting is especially important when taking a picture of a group of people. The old method of taking a picture, checking the picture on the rear LCD, adjust exposure and retake the picture, and repeat until optimum exposure is achieved is too slow for a group picture. Individuals will want to leave if the photographer takes too long to set his/her camera. Using the histogram and EC assigned to a thumb/finger wheel makes setting for optimum exposures REALLY fast and done in one shot. (Even multiple shots for people blinking or looking away can be taken fast in succession by just tripping the shutter.)

 

[Martin_99]

My view is that the two most important things when taking the usual still photos are:

1. Optimum exposure
2. Sharp focus.

As a beginner, maybe try the following:

1. Optimum exposure:
Per Google, the Z6iii only allows zebras in movie mode but not is still mode. That is a real bummer. However, it does allow the histogram overlay in the viewfinder (VF). If that's true, try the following:
..... a. Set the camera to P mode.
..... b. Enable the histogram overlay in the VF.
..... c. Frame the scene in the VF. Adjust exposure compensation so that the bottom right edge of the histogram mountains just touches the right side of the histogram display. (known as the ETTR method of setting exposure) This will give you the optimum exposures without blowing out the highlights.
..... d. Only do steps a and b once. Repeat step-c for every shot. This should result in optimum exposure for almost every shot.

2. Sharp focus:
..... a. Do not use auto focus.
..... b. Set the camera to use center point focus.
..... c. Set the focus square on the subject and half press the shutter button to lock focus. Recompose for the scene you want. Press the shutter so slowly that it surprises you when it trips. That should give your sharp focus on the subject you want.

Experiment with aperture and shutter priority modes as the situations require.

Hope this helps.

Going to give this a shot this weekend

Recommend resetting the camera via the menu first. That will reset any settings you may have set in the past. Then do steps 1 and 2 above.

FYI, one time I was experimenting with low light pictures in the evening. I did not reset my camera the next morning. Pictures I took that morning were using the high ISO setting that I had used the previous evening. Pictures were usable but not of optimum quality like they should have been. Learned my lesson to either reset settings I use to experiment immediately, or to reset the camera to defaults before shooting the next morning.

Sounds as an extreme measure to small issue. Just use autoISO.

Also, if exposure compensation (EC) is not adjustable via a thumb/finger wheel, then check your camera's manual on how to assign EC to a thumb/finger wheel. That will make setting EC really fast in step 1c. ..... Fast exposure setting is especially important when taking a picture of a group of people. The old method of taking a picture, checking the picture on the rear LCD, adjust exposure and retake the picture, and repeat until optimum exposure is achieved is too slow for a group picture. Individuals will want to leave if the photographer takes too long to set his/her camera. Using the histogram and EC assigned to a thumb/finger wheel makes setting for optimum exposures REALLY fast and done in one shot. (Even multiple shots for people blinking or looking away can be taken fast in succession by just tripping the shutter.)

 

[Larry Grady]

I did this a coupel times on my trip. Once I had accidentally turned manual focus on and didn't turn it off.

The other time was ISO, I had set it and left it and took a bunch of shots in a high ISO even though it was a nice, sunny day.

 

[Michael Fryd]

I suspect that your trip photos serve two purposes:

1. You would like to create some great images
2. You would like to memorialize your trip

These are different goals.

A poorly composed photo that shows the hotel room you stayed in may not be a great photo, but in years to come it might bring back some great memories.

.

I have a lot of photos of my kid growing up. Many are not "good photos", however they bring back memories and make me smile.

My advice is not to throw away vacation images simply because they are not "good photos".

 

[mreynolds767]

You covered a wide range of topics and not that I want to intimate you further but will say expect editing to take you longer to get good at it than taking pictures in the field.

Photos in the field there are general rules to follow, editing not so much so it really comes down to hours spent doing it. There is no one size fits all approach. The best edited photos ; that edit was well thought out for that specific image.

There are a couple of steps I do to start and edit which is dial in my white balance, usually turn on chromatic aberration and lens distortion profile. Make any crop/straightening type adjustments next. After that I usually would adjust the exposure slider if needed and then it really comes down to the image and what type of look/mood I am going for which is highly image dependent. Highlights and shadows would usually be next though and try and resist going -100 / +100 with those - many beginners do that because they instantly see more dynamic range but that does really flatten the image and not ideal for most shots.

Think of the above as the BASIC EDITS and then from there you move onto more creative edits. So for your color question. Get the color accurate first with white balance and then you can play with the color calibration, luminance, saturation and HSL panel to get the color look you want. Many things are related ; for example if you bring up the contrast which can be done with the contrast slider, or the curves tool or by bringing down exposure and rising the whites ; any of these contrast tools will also boost the colors in your image so for this reason I would usually tackle contrast before final color adjustments.

Sometimes I know in the field when I take the shot exactly how I want to edit it ; other times I don't until I review on the computer.

The good thing is you already have discovered the Lightroom Auto tool applied to your RAW file can get you to a good point for at least a majority of your photos and you may wish to leave it at that which is perfectly acceptable and still likely better than had you shot JPEG and not edited.

Anything Lightroom auto tool brings out is obviously caught by the sensor so 100% your shot, I would not ethically worry about any boundary there ; should you choose to dial it up more or lower is entirely up to you.

Don't kid yourself that in the film darkroom days you did not have ability to control the final outcome to be quite different from the original. Take a second look at Ansel Adams work.

I would usually for most beginners advise to take photos in JPEG + RAW. Edit the RAW and compare to the JPEG without additional edits. Choose the best one. When it gets to the point that you constantly pick the edited RAW over the JPEG ; than you can switch the camera to only shoot RAW.

As far as only keeping a small portion of your trip photos = totally normal. What will improve is you will have a harder time culling them because overtime you won't have more than a very small percentage that are out of focus, not properly exposed, etc..

I went on a Safari this year ; took thousands of photos. For me this was a bucket list trip and wanted to capture some great images. I have thus far gotten that number down to about 50 pictures for my own personal enjoyment and so far 20 that I think are the best photos and have not really shared them yet as I still think no one wants to see 20 photos of my safari. My end goal is to eventually get that best list down to 10 at the very most and that could take me many more weeks.

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