Properly Set Your Digital Camera For Better Photos

A photo with deficient image quality may have options to lessen the damage but fixes are limited - if even possible. The good news is we can fix future photos by setting our cameras properly. Being a society of instant gratification we tend to not want to be bothered with pesky details, most of us feeling we are not professional photographers so why bother with all that stuff in the camera’s user manual.

To a certain extent, that may be a reasonable determination. However, there are some settings we need to know about in order to minimize the disappointments of the deficient photo. These pointers are not meant to be Digital Photography 101. In fact, all the experts seem to have a different opinion. The intent is to help you help yourself to become a better digital image taker through a little knowledge.

We buy digital cameras of whatever mega pixels and we are ready to burn up the world of photography. We are excited, energized, confident and capture wonderful moment after wonderful moment. Then we try to enlarge those new digital images that look so perfect on our computer but when we do, the image gets jagged or pixelated (a resolution issue) and/or has horrible splotches of color and ghosting, aka noise (an image quality issue). Alas, these special never-to-get-again captures are good only for emailing to others or viewing on our computer. Disappointing.

A digital camera is an information gatherer. When the picture is taken, the camera records information regarding colors, image, everything. This information in the digital image is made up of pixels which are tiny dots arranged horizontally and vertically in the image. The more pixels in an image, the crisper the detail in the image. The number of pixels horizontally and vertically of a particular image multiplied together gives you the pixel count (in millions) that is referred to as . For example, a 10 Mega Pixel camera typically takes an image that is 3888 x 2592.

Pixels make up the image and resolution is the number of pixels in the image captured by the camera. A low resolution image has relatively few pixels captured resulting in the image lacking detail and will likely appear jagged when enlarged. The higher the resolution of the image, the greater the number of pixels have been captured and the image will maintain its integrity when enlarged for printing.

You must read your manual for resolution settings then find the setting in your camera menu. They may designate it as a Large, Medium or Small picture (or file) that may be accompanied by dimensions (width x height) or just the dimensions themselves. Highest would be Large and/or the largest dimension. Yes, this highest setting will reduce the number of pictures you can take before downloading and that is a decision you will have to make. But the good news is that data storage is cheap and you can always delete photos off the camera you don’t want.

The other important setting is image quality. Again, look in your manual for this setting, maybe shown as compression quality or as normal, fine, superfine. Image quality relates to the amount of compression to the image which directly effects color. You want whatever your camera designates as the least compression, perhaps shown as superfine or best. You can always reduce the file size or compression for emailing later but you cannot restore the information that is never collected in the first place

There are many digital camera owners these days who are finding themselves to be pretty good photographers and quite clever in finding unique and interesting shots. And more and more people are experiencing the distinct pleasure of having their photos printed on canvas. They send in their favorite photo only to find the image cannot be used or, at best, will result in a low quality canvas. It is very disappointing but can be avoided by setting the camera properly. The quality of the source photo is directly related to the quality of your canvas.

Most of us take pictures for fun and personal history. We want to pull out our camera, snap the photo and have it be good enough for whatever we want to do with it. Those special, incredible shots present themselves without notice and if our camera is not correctly set, we may lose out on having options for enlarging and printing that once-in-a-lifetime shot. It’s up to you how to set your camera, but, if you set it to its highest resolution and best image quality, you can’t go wrong.

Hopefully, these tips have shed some light on your digital camera setting needs that will allow your digital camera to be the best it can be so your photos can be the best that they can be. Having your camera set properly will give you more satisfaction from your photography efforts.

In summary, read your manual, set your camera and keep focused!

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