MaximumPC 2004 12

How To...^ A step-by-step guide to tweaking your PC Experience

Take better photos, fix the flaws,

and get perfect prints

W

hether you just got your first digital camera or

you’re looking to build on your picture-taking

skills, you’ve come to the right place. Any bozo

can take OK shots with most point-and-shoot digicams,

but with a little extra know-how, your digital pictures

can look incredible!

Sure, cameras have plenty of autopilot controls

that’ll do the dirty work for you, but they won’t always

give you the results you’re after. You’ll get better,

more compelling pictures if you exercise some control

over the exposure, shutter speed, and focus settings.

To help you get the most out of your investment, we’ll

show you how to work your camera’s controls to cap-

ture great images, fix problems and enhance details

in an image editor, and optimize your pics for print.

AND SCORE

SHOOT

BY +RIS &ONG

WHAT YOULL NEED

4 Any digital camera

with manual controls,

such as the Kodak

DX6490 pictured above

4 A computer with a

USB port

4 Image editing soft-

ware such as Adobe

Photoshop Elements

($100, http://www.adoBe.coM ),

LView Pro ($40, http://www.

lview.coM ), or Pixia

(free, http://parK1

.waKwaK.coM/^piXia )

4 A color printer, such as

the Canon i9900 pic-

tured here

Shoot better images

Before we can show you how to touch up

your pics, you need to get familiar with how

pictures are made. For a camera to create

an exposure —an even balance of highlights

and shadows—light from a subject enters

the camera, exposes the image sensor, and

becomes digitized. Your camera has two con-

trols—the aperture and shutter—that can be

automated or manually controlled to regu-

late the amount of light that enters the lens.

The aperture is a hole surrounded by thin

blades that can be widened (to let in more

light) or narrowed (to let in less light). It

functions like your eye’s iris and pupil. The

shutter functions like a gate, controlling how

long the image sensor is exposed—think of

it as the eyelid.

 CONSIDER YOUR COMPOSITION

Aperture size, measured in f-stops (the

larger the number, the narrower the size)

affects the focal range within an image,

and can help you capture compelling por-

traits and still lifes.

A wide aperture (such as f-2.8) creates a

narrow depth of field —the range in which all

objects appear to be in sharp focus—to cap-

ture a sharply focused subject while blurring

its foreground and background. A narrow

aperture (such as f-16) creates a wider depth

of field to capture a larger range of objects

in sharp focus. Depth of field capabilities

vary—SLRs generally offer a greater range

than cameras with built-in lenses.

One of the great things about a digi-

tal camera is it doesn’t cost anything to

experiment! To explore your camera’s

USING THE APERTURE

4

DECEMBER 2004 MA XIMUMPC