Originally posted by reoterq 1. Playing around with action shots (daughter doing gymnastics in the living room) I set the camera on continuous shooting and pulled the trigger. I got 1 shot. After multiple tries with the same result, I'm under the impression that I can't shoot multiple shots w/ the flash on.
Hmm, I almost never shoot with the built-in flash, but I guess not. If the camera is set for flash, I think it does wait until the flash is recharged and ready to fire before allowing another shot. There is a setting to override this behavior in the camera. It's in the menu, custom settings. On my *ist DS (whose menus are similar to the K100D's) it's called "release when charging". But I don't think it will really do you a lot of good. If you need the flash, you'll be better off using the flash -- and just learning when to click the shutter.
Quote: 2. Setting the camera to "no flash" allowed me to shoot multiple shots, but with a good amount of motion blur, which I'm guessing means adjust the shutter speed.
Well, if it's really motion blur -- if some part of the shot is in focus -- then yes, you'd need to increase your shutter speed.
When you shoot with flash, the flash itself to some extent replaces the shutter speed to freeze action. In other words, with flash, you can use a shorter shutter speed and still stop the action reasonably well.
What mode are you using to shoot? Try putting the camera into P mode, and pop up the flash. Practice your timing so you can get the camera to click just at the right instant to capture the subject's pose, in mid-somersault or whatever.
Quote: So now I'm reading the manual and I get that there are 3 main values I need to understand: Shutter speed, aperture, and ISO. What settings would get me in the ballpark for stop-motion photography of a little gymnast in a living room?
There's a bit more to it than that, but for basic exposure, those are the three key elements.
I shoot a lot of indoor sports, although mostly in gymnasia, not so much in my living room. For indoor volleyball and basketball, I typically set my shutter speed to something like 1/250th sec or a little faster if the light in the gym is better than average; I set the aperture to f/2.8. If I'm using my K10D, I use TAv mode and let the camera figure out what ISO to use, but it will usually be at least 800, often 1100 and sometimes 1600. If I'm using the *ist DS, which doesn't have a TAv mode, I just set the ISO to 1600 and leave it there.
I never use flash when shooting sports, by the way. There's too great a chance of it causing harm to the athlete.
Quote: 3. What is EV Compensation?
It's basically a way of overriding the camera's built-in meter's sense of what constitutes a correct, balanced exposure.
I think EV stands for "exposure value." The camera's meter takes the light gathered from the scene and tells you whether that light is above or below what the meter thinks is a correct, balanced exposure, or if it's exactly on target. Now, as you learn your camera, you'll learn that certain scenes -- say, a backlit scene -- may cause the camera to think more light is coming in, but you want to expose for the subject in the foreground, who is a bit dark, rather than for the bright background, so if you were using P, Tv or Av mode on your camera, you'd push the EV up a bit, say to +1. This tells the meter to
overexpose the entire scene. That may cause some of the background to be blown out, but it will cause the subject in the center to be exposed correctly.
How does it work? Well, in Tv (shutter priority) mode, if you set the shutter to 1/250th sec, ISO to 800, and the camera without EV compensation thinks that the correct aperture = f/8, if you push the EV to +1, the camera will automatically set the aperture to f/5.6 (one stop wider than f/8). If you're in Av (aperture priority mode), with the aperture set to f/5.6, ISO set to 800, and the meter without EV compensation thinks the right shutter speed = 1/250th sec, if you adjust the EV to -1 (asking the camera to underexpose by one stop), then it will push the shutter speed to 1/500th sec. In P mode, the camera is controlling all three variables and it uses its so-called program line to decide whether to adjust aperture, shutter, both, whatever.
If you shoot in M (manual) mode, then you don't have EV compensation available because you're manually controlling all the elements of the exposure.
The best thing you can do for yourself as a photographer is learn how to take advantage of manual mode. It's got the reputation of being hard. It's not, really. Learn how to read the meter in the viewfinder, and how to control the shutter, aperture and ISO, and simply twiddle the settings until the meter says the exposure is balanced. Learning to use M mode will get you thinking about how you control depth of field with the aperture, and how you stop motion with the shutter speed. If you don't feel ready for full manual, try using Tv or Av.
Will