Top Ten Things to Know About Digital Photography

1. All digital images require processing. Just because the image is visible, doesn’t mean it doesn’t require processing. Whether you choose to let the camera do the processing, or do it yourself in “post”, it’s still a necessary step.
2. Digital photography favors underexposure. You can almost always extract some information from an underexposed digital image during processing, but overexposure results in pure white areas in which there is absolutely no information.
3. Always know your Image Quality setting. Unless you have very little remaining space left on your flash memory card, using the highest setting available.
4. Always know your ISO. ISO has a significant impact on image quality. If set incorrectly, it will result in noisy, low resolution images. Avoid Auto ISO.
5. Always know your White balance. Be sure to set your white balance manually when you know what the ambient light temperature is, and use Auto White Balance when you don’t. You won’t need to buy specially balanced film or conversion filters anymore, but you will need to know how to set your camera.
6. The most important control on your digital camera is the exposure compensation button. There’s no such thing as “Auto Exposure”. The sooner you begin to rely on the auto exposure system of your camera, the sooner it will let you down. Auto exposure puts you “in the ballpark”. It’s up to you to know how to use the exposure compensation button to hit the ball out of the ballpark.
7. Learn how to interpret a scene’s values. A dark scene should look dark in the photo. The camera will try to make it look like a sunny day. Know how to interpret the lighting conditions of the scene and set the exposure accordingly.
8. Don’t stand in one place when composing images. Keep your zoom lens at its widest setting, and move around the subject observing the scale and position of the subject in relationship to its surroundings. Only when you’ve found the best position and distance should you adjust the zoom to suit the composition by cropping it.
9. Don’t always center the subject in the frame. Observing the “Golden Ratio” or “Rule of Thirds” will produce engaging photos that more effectively direct the viewer’s eye to the subject.
10. A good photograph has vey little to do with the camera. Photography is all about visualization, recognizing a compelling image, capturing it, and presenting it in such a way as to substantiate that vision.