Re: 5 Digital Camera Questions

On Wed, 16 Jun 2004, Etienne Garbaux wrote:

> If you haven't changed it, the camera default is "continuous focus" (MENU,
> then 10 down on the camera icon list). So, it is always focusing while it
> is on, and pressing the shutter button halfway STOPS the focusing to expose
> the shot.

I hear it grinding delicately away, so assume it's on continuous. Still,I
usually have the camera *Off*, and turn it on, frame and shoot VERY
quickly. But perhaps it just focuses very quickly. (I hope to get a
bit more confident and take the extra second or two to focus kosher.) But
speaking of rapid, did folks see this week's NY Times Circuits section
with the new x brand (I forget which & the paper has been recycled)
digital camera with supposedly no shutter lag at all..? But if you read
all the way to the end, and then compare with the rating for, say, Nikon,
Canon, et al, it's about a half second faster, if that.

> If you switch to "Single" focus, the focus motor stays off until
> you press the shutter button halfway, at which time it "snaps" into focus
> for the shot. The focus motor doesn't run again until you release the
> shutter button (after, or without, taking a picture) and press it halfway
> again. I leave mine on continuous focus.

Why do single focus? To save battery?

Speaking of which, I'm daring to hope that my early battery problems were
a sort of breaking in ;-). Today the Canon battery ran out and when I
replaced it with the spare, I saw my note that I'd put it in on May 30. So
it lasted 18 days... which I gather is OK. Some days the use was light,
but some days heavy -- last night for instance, my niece played back every
one of the 50 or so photographs on the card, s-l-o-w-l-y. I was so
enchanted to see her interest, I didn't have the heart to tell her to
hurry up.

> > I'd bet that the G5 and its manual were NOT your first digital
> > camera, or if so, that you had some ancillary guidance. The manual may
> > work if you have some context, I find not if not.
>
> It is my second, but it followed so closely on the heels of the first that
> it could just as well have been my first. What can I say? I've spent my
> life not reading instructions and just playing with things. Digicams are
> among the first items I've had to use the manual to get to know fully.
> (Who am I kidding? Nowhere near fully, just usefully.)

Etienne, I trust you won't mind my saying you must be a genius. That's
the only explanation.

In fact, what finished off my battery this AM was trying to set the EV to
-.7, like Chris ! I had the manual open to the page, and spent at least a
half hour (ready to scream -- girls are like that) trying to make it
happen. It required a series of menu steps which were NOT stated on the
page, and which I finally achieved after a long period of random flailing
but could not recapitulate without re-flailing. (The G5 Short Course
book, promised for yesterday, has still not arrived -- I gnash my teeth.)

One other point on something new to me, but maybe not to others -- I came
home tonight after dark, though there were a lot of lights on the street.
I took a shot of a couple (two shirts) without the flash, then thinking I
should do the right thing, again, with the flash. The non-flash picture
was much better -- showed a lot of background, which looked good. In the
flash picture the background was all black... though maybe the slow
synchro would have had more ? (Maybe it's better the book didn't arrive
yet -- I am free to imagine it will explain all such things.)

cheers,

Judy
Received on Fri Jun 18 21:55:15 2004