[aiamuzz]

Hi,

TBH l, I am a noob at photography, with less than 24 hrs of hands on time (over a course of less than a month) of DSLR time with my brothers Canon 1200D - lenses 18-55mm(stock) and 55-250mm ...

Whilst I have been experimenting slowly with the 3 variables(ISO, Shutter Speed & Aperture), I must say I have been learning quite a lot, drawing up my own little tests so I can understand relation and correlation of these 3 variables.

I have been analysing the various presets modes(Portrait, Landscape, Macro, Sports & Night-Portrait) ... I tried to reproduce/recreate the preset in*Manual Mode,**but fell short in reproducing them.

So I thought I'd pose the same as a challenge to the DSLR Afficionado's out there. Please post a preset and then your manual photo of the same frame side by side so we can identify a pro among us.

A FUN EXERCISE !!!

PS: We(noobs of the DSLR ) would really appreciate if you shared your manual settings describing how you achieved/came closer to the presets you were attempting. I am sure we noobs will stand to benefit from the Amateurs and Pro's of the DSLR world)

Cheers & thnx in advance for indulging.

[texandrews]

Hi,

TBH l, I am a noob at photography, with less than 24 hrs of hands on time (over a course of less than a month) of DSLR time with my brothers Canon 1200D - lenses 18-55mm(stock) and 55-250mm ...

So, that's hardly any time at all. For any endeavor---driving a car, cooking, riding a bike, &etc. It took me a year to get the basics down, and over a decade to consistently get images I was proud of---and that's with a studio art background. Give it significantly more time is my first advice.

Whilst I have been experimenting slowly with the 3 variables(ISO, Shutter Speed & Aperture), I must say I have been learning quite a lot, drawing up my own little tests so I can understand relation and correlation of these 3 variables.

I have been analysing the various presets modes(Portrait, Landscape, Macro, Sports & Night-Portrait) ... I tried to reproduce/recreate the preset in*Manual Mode,**but fell short in reproducing them.

Well, that's because these modes are jpg modes if I'm not mistaken, and there's more internal processing to these than just the 3 variables of ISO, Shutter Speed, and Aperture. To reproduce these you need to wade into post processing.

So I thought I'd pose the same as a challenge to the DSLR Afficionado's out there. Please post a preset and then your manual photo of the same frame side by side so we can identify a pro among us.

Therefore be advised that the examples you may get are going to involve other factors.

A FUN EXERCISE !!!

PS: We(noobs of the DSLR ) would really appreciate if you shared your manual settings describing how you achieved/came closer to the presets you were attempting. I am sure we noobs will stand to benefit from the Amateurs and Pro's of the DSLR world)

Cheers & thnx in advance for indulging.

[vector]

I’m not going to go take photos for this but here is what I would expect these “presets” to do, though preset is the wrong way to describe this as it sort of suggests fixed settings which is not the case.

Portrait will prioritize depth of field control, keeping the aperture open wide and boosting shutter speed to compensate if too bright or iso to compensate if too dark. Shutter speed should stay above about 1/100 or so.

Landscape will prioritize depth of field the other direction, stopping down the aperture for more depth of field and sacrifice shutter speed allowing it to get quite low since landscapes are generally static.

Macro needs deep depth of field and for the lens to have close focus capabilities.

Sports will prioritize fast shutter speeds to freeze motion generally pushing iso higher to compensate.

Night lacks light so it needs slow shutter speeds and wide aperture to let in the maximum amount.

These are good exercises for you to go through and learn. Good luck, it’s a challenging and rewarding hobby.

[aiamuzz]

@texandrews ... Thanks for the replies, I agree I have negligible flying hours under my belt. ...

While I am trying to add to my flying time, I would like to know if it's a good test(matching semi-presets in Manual Mode) for a pro and if he'll be able to actually match the 'semi-Presets' image outputs in 'Manual Mode' ?

Is this a practical possibility or it's just theoretical and these semi-Presets are far from achievable ?

@vector ... Is this exercise of trying to match these auto modes in Manual is even plausible ? I mean in theory it should be, for as a novice I am guessing the Manual Mode is granular to the last grain in terms of controlling every single parameter(with the user having full power over a camera's full potential) ...

But as a novice I can't be sure of my assumption ... Look forward to the community to bust bubbles in my assumptions and theories ...

Yes it is a very satisfying hobby indeed, this hobby introduces us to the beauty of nature, at a level that takes one's breath away, it introduces us to natures intricate beauty which otherwise isn't visible to a naked eye. It enables us to capture that rare beauty and moment with no chance of reproducing that frame ever again ...

PS: I WOULD STILL LIKE THE COMMUNITY TO PARTICIPATE IN THIS CHALLENGE(WITH THE PHOTOS) SO WE NOOBS CAN MARVEL YOUR CONTROL AND COMMAND OVER YOUR HARDWARE ... YOUR SIDE NOTES ABOUT THE SETTINGS THAT HELPED YOU ACHIEVE THAT MANUAL TWIN SHOT OF ITS AUTO SIBLING ... WILL CERTAINLY ENRICH US NOOBS.

Cheers.

[texandrews]

@texandrews ... Thanks for the replies, I agree I have negligible flying hours under my belt. ...

While I am trying to add to my flying time, I would like to know if it's a good test(matching semi-presets in Manual Mode) for a pro and if he'll be able to actually match the 'semi-Presets' image outputs in 'Manual Mode' ?

Is this a practical possibility or it's just theoretical and these semi-Presets are far from achievable ?

@vector ... Is this exercise of trying to match these auto modes in Manual is even plausible ? I mean in theory it should be, for as a novice I am guessing the Manual Mode is granular to the last grain in terms of controlling every single parameter(with the user having full power over a camera's full potential) ...

But as a novice I can't be sure of my assumption ... Look forward to the community to bust bubbles in my assumptions and theories ...

Yes it is a very satisfying hobby indeed, this hobby introduces us to the beauty of nature, at a level that takes one's breath away, it introduces us to natures intricate beauty which otherwise isn't visible to a naked eye. It enables us to capture that rare beauty and moment with no chance of reproducing that frame ever again ...

PS: I WOULD STILL LIKE THE COMMUNITY TO PARTICIPATE IN THIS CHALLENGE(WITH THE PHOTOS) SO WE NOOBS CAN MARVEL YOUR CONTROL AND COMMAND OVER YOUR HARDWARE ... YOUR SIDE NOTES ABOUT THE SETTINGS THAT HELPED YOU ACHIEVE THAT MANUAL TWIN SHOT OF ITS AUTO SIBLING ... WILL CERTAINLY ENRICH US NOOBS.

Cheers.

Well...I have been a manual shooter basically since I started in the '70's----my first good camera gave me no other options. In film days also manual---never had an auto camera. This changed with the turnover to digital, but after my very first basic P&S, I quickly started shooting raw and stopped shooting jpg's. Now the only jpg's I shoot are with my phone or on occasion for timelapses at work (although it's possible I will start shooting raw there as well....maybe. Depends how long the TL's will have to be). So, not since 2005 have I regularly shot jpg's, and that was only as raw+jpg, and not with any mode but aperture priority. Upon reviewing these images, I started to wonder about jpg in general for serious, non quick turnaround shooting. Why should I let an engineer in Japan determine what my images should look like?

So, the premise of trying to match these modes is rather alien to me based on my experience with photography. Not to say these modes aren't nice for folks who dodn't want to get involved with PP, the modern darkroom. That is indeed another significant time investment to learn those skills.

As I said, these modes are going to be applying certain sharpening, saturation, contrast & maybe more to the jpg's, so really what we're talking about here is reverse engineering that processing in one's own post processing---and this is not going to be reflected in the 3 settings you are talking about.

[aiamuzz]

Well...I have been a manual shooter basically since I started in the '70's----my first good camera gave me no other options. In film days also manual---never had an auto camera. This changed with the turnover to digital, but after my very first basic P&S, I quickly started shooting raw and stopped shooting jpg's. Now the only jpg's I shoot are with my phone or on occasion for timelapses at work (although it's possible I will start shooting raw there as well....maybe. Depends how long the TL's will have to be). So, not since 2005 have I regularly shot jpg's, and that was only as raw+jpg, and not with any mode but aperture priority. Upon reviewing these images, I started to wonder about jpg in general for serious, non quick turnaround shooting. Why should I let an engineer in Japan determine what my images should look like?

oh really ?

So, the premise of trying to match these modes is rather alien to me based on my experience with photography. Not to say these modes aren't nice for folks who dodn't want to get involved with PP, the modern darkroom. That is indeed another significant time investment to learn those skills.

ok ... PP ... you mean post processing ?

As I said, these modes are going to be applying certain sharpening, saturation, contrast & maybe more to the jpg's, so really what we're talking about here is reverse engineering that processing in one's own post processing---and this is not going to be reflected in the 3 settings you are talking about.

Why should I let an engineer in Japan determine what my images should look like?

Exactly, even i don't want to be using the presets, that is the whole point of posting this challenge to the community, with the intention of learning skills from amateurs and pros alike ...

for example i liked the profiles(or whatever they are called) that go by the names 'Vivid' and 'Intense' ... i liked the way they captured the color, the richness of it and at the same time coated the scene in a yellowish tint/hue, which i like any day as compared to the more 'whitish' tint/hue when i tried matching the ISO/Speed/Aperture settings from the respective automatic profiles/modes.

Through this challenge I hoped i could find ways to enrich my scenes with richness of color and the yellowish tint/hue in the manual mode like the profiles Vivid and Intense had.

I would like to know if there was a way to bring in these profiles(vivid/intense) into the Manual Mode settings somehow ? with the richness of colors and the yellowish hue added to my shots I hope to raise the appeal of my captures.

[texandrews]

ok ... PP ... you mean post processing ?

Yes

for example i liked the profiles(or whatever they are called) that go by the names 'Vivid' and 'Intense' ... i liked the way they captured the color, the richness of it

So, when doing PP, that's handled by your saturation slider for the most part (and in Lightroom maybe "vibrance", but there's also contrast to play with, and in Lightroom "clarity"

and at the same time coated the scene in a yellowish tint/hue, which i like any day as compared to the more 'whitish' tint/hue when i tried matching the ISO/Speed/Aperture settings from the respective automatic profiles/modes.

basically here you're talking about the color temperature/tint of the image, also something that you can adjust in PP. These have nothing to do with ISO, aperture, or shutter speed. But depending on the camera you have, you may be able to do your own adjustments on the jpg output independently of the modes, saving them as a user preset.

Through this challenge I hoped i could find ways to enrich my scenes with richness of color and the yellowish tint/hue in the manual mode like the profiles Vivid and Intense had.

What I'd caution you about here is the tendency to "overproduce" your images. It's like music: sometimes spare is better than "the wall of sound" or strings added. Lots of music has been ruined by overproduction. In digital photography, it's so easy to over saturate, over-intensify, and now over process in terms of color temperature and "film look" filters (Instagram), that it's all been done to a fault. And internet photography forums are full of examples----along with scorn and disdain for these styles.


By your admission you are new to this. In film days different films had different "looks", and photographers tended to gravitate to the ones they prefered, or that suited the subjects. And of course filters were used on the lenses for their color or contrast effects. I would spend some time looking at books of wonderful photography to discover what appeals to you the most---and then try to match that with your own. All artists start their serious work through copying. Even if you only aspire to have fun, it's still not a bad idea to get a handle on your own taste. That's the best thing you could do for yourself right now. Any examples you get in this thread will actually teach you little.

And as I've mentioned above, you are either going to have to dial in your preferences yourself in your camera, or learn some post processing. Don't be afraid of PP---it can be very rewarding, and can still be done with jpgs if you don't want to shoot raw.

I would like to know if there was a way to bring in these profiles(vivid/intense) into the Manual Mode settings somehow ? with the richness of colors and the yellowish hue added to my shots I hope to raise the appeal of my captures.

As I said above, you'd do this by creating your own user preset(s) in camera, if your camera allows this. But I would think you should also be able to shoot in manual mode, that allows you to control ISO, aperture, and shutter speed, and also use one of your camera's built-in jpg presets (which you have called modes)---again, these don't effect the exposure of your images usually, just how the jpg engine renders them further..