Chapter 1. Camera Controls & Creativity

Serious digital cameras give you creative control over your images. They do so by allowing you to control the light and motion in photographs as well as what's sharp and what isn't. Although most consumer digital cameras are fully automatic, some allow you to make minor adjustments that affect your images. Many cameras, including high-end point and shoots and digital SLRs, offer a wide range of controls. However, regardless of what controls your camera has, the same basic principles are at work "under the hood". Your automatic exposure and focusing systems are having a profound effect on your images. However, even with your camera on automatic mode, you can indirectly control, or at least take advantage of the effects these systems have on your images.

In this chapter, we'll first explore how you use the camera in various automatic modes and see what effect each of the settings has on your images. In the chapters that follow, we'll explore in greater depth how you take control of these settings, and others, to get the effects that you want.