Digital Photography Digital Field Guide

Quick Tour: QT Shooting Your First Digital Photo

In This Chapter

• Selecting exposure mode

• Focusing and choosing focus mode

• Previewing depth of field

• Selecting image format

• Taking the picture

• Reviewing the image

• Printing your photographs

It's really exciting to buy a new digital camera.

If you're like me, what you want to do right away is go out and take some pictures.

What you may not want to do is to stop and read a manual — particularly a manual that is complex and written in English that treads not-too-delicately around the edges of incomprehensibility. (The manual probably reads like it has been translated through several languages, in no case by a native speaker.)

If you've never used a digital camera before — or even if you have — the steps you need to take to prepare your new camera may seem baffling. In addition, if you are not a photography pro, the meaning and implications of the camera's settings may not be readily apparent, nor may it be clear from the camera manual how much of this stuff you really need to know before you can just start taking pictures.

This chapter tells what you need to know to get a quick start taking pictures with your new digital camera.

Figure QT.1 shows you an overview diagram of the steps involved in preparing your camera, taking your first photo, and printing it or saving it for the Web.

Figure QT.1. Preparing a digital camera, taking a photo, and printing ...