What settings on CoolPix 885?

[cath]

Wheeeee! I succumbed to Best Buy's 0% financing for 18 months deal and bought a CoolPix 885

Now I'm reading through the manual (no, not here at work, but in the late night hours..), trying things, etc. Geeze, now I gotta learn a whole new way to take pix. In your vast experience with Nikon equipment (RickO, Bill-E, Johnny, et al) what are the best settings to use for Reef Pix?

Also...now that I have a digital camera, I can begin thinking seriously about a web site. Which ones are free/cheap? I'm a poor librarian reef keeper. Need I say more?

[Drew]

Cath, I don't know about the 885, but the settings depend on what you want to take a picture of. In most cases though, one thing holds true, you will want a tripod. For corals, I shoot in macro mode, zoom in/out till I hit the "sweet spot" I usually shoot macros in cneter weight, as opposed to matrix. Also, try to shoot perpendicular to the glass, otherwise, the pics look blurry. If shooting fish, I get the fastest shudder speed I can get, and just take a lot of pics, hoping one of them will turn out. For fish, I use matrix, sometimes I use the flash and just cover it up. I am really still working on how to shoot fish You have a great camera, good luck with it!







Drew

[MontanaRocknReefer]

Congrats cath!! You will have so much fun with your new digital!! I just been learning by trial and error! I have done pretty much what Drew has done so not much to add!

Hey Drew I liked the bee on the flower pic!!

Johnny

[asmith]

I agree with the above advice. I have a 995 and I have just been taking lots of pictures and experimenting with different settings. That seems to be the best way to learn. Just take lots of shots and keep the good ones. That is the best things about digital cameras. You don't have to worry about wasting expensive film on bad photos.

Andrew

[cath]

Thanks, guys! I appreciate your suggestions. Got lots of reading and sperimenting to do. If you think of anything brilliant, send it on!

BTW, Andrew....I love that quote from e e cummings. I heard that Robert Frost put "farmer" on his IRS forms. hehehe

[Rick O]

Hi Cath,

Here's some tips that have proven to work well for me. Always use a tripod. Shoot in macro mode whenever possible. Like Drew said, it's very important to shoot perpendicular to the glass. The auto-focus has trouble focusing if the camera is at too much of an angle to the glass. I prefer to not use the flash. This could present some problems depending on what type of lighting you have. When I had VHO only the actinics made the pics appear a little purple.

Why don't you go ahead and post some of the pics you've already taken.

[clyde]

yeah post.

I usually just click it on, use the LCD monitor a LOT - move in/out left right, down, up finding a good focus spot and zoom in, zoom out.

'point and shoot' does not apply here

steady hand is good idea when you click on the button, usually it scews up if you press too hard, and it moves the camera.


sometimes photoshoping the pictures work nicely. (no not garfing but working with it)

as seen here

[Drew]

Ooops, I forgot this. Here is a website which helped me a lot:
http://www.reefs.org/library/talklog...lk_013101.html


Drew