Delving the menus

Ok, so far I have basically played with my camera’s iAuto setting.  On the dial are a number of other settings that I’ve attempted to use but suffice to say there haven’t been many photos worth keeping.  I still have a long way to go.  Yesterday’s trip hi-lighted how much more I need to learn about how to use my camera.  I need to understand what the myriad of menus can do.  So far it has been a case of press the menu button and then get lost.  What applies to what, how it affects what I’m doing, oh, forget it, it’s all too hard.

Today I found a YouTube video  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRYUEgp23iY that helped me play with the menus and discover some of the tools to take better or more interesting photos or how to use some special effects. 🙂

The first thing I played with were the SCN or scene settings.  This is where you set the camera to best adjust itself for Landscape, Portrait, Fireworks etc.  I found a setting to help with wobbly camera or moving objects.  It was rather breezy outside at the time.  Actually it was windy!  So I tested this mode to get a shot of one of the capsicum flower buds.

Then I tried the ART settings and a function called BRACKETING.  So I take a shot and then using bracketing it applies the selected ART settings to the photo.  I had 11 ART settings chosen….. most were just awful, but I found one that was interesting.  The first is the original shot not ART settings, the second has Dramatic Tone applied.

Finally, I found a rather exciting feature called PANORAMA.  Hmmm, wonder how that works?  The instructions were that it allowed a series to be ‘stitched’ together on the computer.  How hard can that be?  Well as I found out, it is directional.  I didn’t save the failed image 🙂  Here is a pic that is the view from my front door.  As you can see the storm is coming from the west, and the wind played a bit of havoc with the sun and cloud cover but as a first attempt I am rather proud.