Snake Photograph Tips?

[Gemini8910]

I keep trying to take pictures of my snake Lorenzo but I can't seem to get any good ones. :( I have a little digital camera, I guess it's called a "point and shoot". It doesn't let me change a whole lot of settings (well it does, but not the ones I want like shutter speed and Iso), and I have no idea what any of the ones I can change do. :/ My avatar picture is the best picture of him, and that was taken by my brother on his iPhone! An iPhone is better than my camera. >_> Here's some of my better pictures (just posting links so you can see more of them without making the page huge), and then I'll list out some of my settings, maybe someone here knows what they are.

The iPhone Picture (http://tinypic.com/r/211m9zc/6)

Picture 1, in viv. (http://tinypic.com/r/otew42/6)

Picture 2, in viv, on top of skull (http://tinypic.com/r/111trpk/6)

Picture 3, on my mom's arm. (http://tinypic.com/r/35m2kxj/6)

Picture 4, on my arm (taken by mom) (http://tinypic.com/r/4sjiw4/6)

Picture 5, on my mom's arm again. (http://tinypic.com/r/23wwoyc/6)

So, I'm obviously doing something wrong. >_< Here's the settings I can change on my camera.

Flash on and off, self explanatory.

A little flower on and off, it's supposed to be macro but I never could get it to work.

Timer or Multiburst. I need to use multiburst I think. :P I don't know if I tried that. I have one that takes 3 pictures slower and makes them all separate and one that takes 16 really fast and puts them in a grid. Link to example of the 16 burst. (http://tinypic.com/r/2yv4g11/6)

Zoom in and out. Don't know if I should use zoom or just get closer or farther away.

Image Resolution: 6M, 3M, 2M, or VGA. I'm pretty sure it's megapixals, I have it set to 6 but I'm not sure what VGA does. o_O

Image Quality: Good, Better, Best. Obviously it's on best.

Focus Zone: Multi-zone, center, selected area. I have no idea what it does. It has to do with the brackets on the screen, it's set on multizone.

Ev Compensation: No clue on this one either. It's set to 0,0 but it can go a bunch of different ways. I can go down to -0,3 -0,7 -1,0 -1,3 -1, 7 and -2,0. I can go up and get those same numbers except with a plus. It's currently on 0,0.

M-Burst Interval: I can change the 16 burst time! Right now it's on 1/30 Sec. I can choose 1/15 Sec and 1/7.5 Sec.

I have a ton of different stuff under Setup: File No., Digital Zoom, Quick View, Camera Sound, Auto LCD Off, Auto Power Off, Video out, USB Mode, Date Stamp, Date & Time, Language, Image Storage, Format, Reset, Voice Memo, About. Most of those are just on or off.

And then I have scene. Here's all the scenes I can choose from: Auto,P-Mode, Portrait, Night Portrait, Landscape, Sport, Night Landscape, Backlight, Museum, Snow, Sunset, Fireworks, Party, Beach, Copy, Video.

So yeah. Help on settings would be cool, and tons of tips for what I need to do. I was in a photography class at school and I still can't take good pictures. Although all those for school were stationary objects, not live reptiles! ;) Thanks!~ :)

[proileri]

In P-mode, you should be able to change settings like shutter speed and ISO. They might be hidden in some menu.

What you should do: Have the snake under a good light. Set ISO to 400 if it doesn't add too much graininess. Use macro mode. Use focus zone center. Do not use zoom or burst. Go close, so the snake fills most of the screen. Use 6 MP setting, then crop and resize in computer software to suitable size.

[Nanci]

That's pretty much what I was going to say. Use Macro, and focus zone center, or selected. Can you tell when the autofocus locks on to something? I _do_ like to use multi-burst- that's a good way to get tongue shots. My camera will still let me take single shots in that setting if I let off the shutter.

I would start in an easy setting. Snake in a small white deli cup, with bright overhead lighting. Either use flash if you don't have good software to process your images, or don't, if you can edit them. Fill the screen with the snake, but realize that your lens will have a distance it can't get closer than, probably something like 4-6".

You can also practice on flowers or other things that don't move.

[Nanci]

This is what editing does for you. I have not altered the colors- just increased sharpness, cropped, things like that. This is a point and shoot camera.

[Hexadeci]

A little flower on and off, it's supposed to be macro but I never could get it to work.

Timer or Multiburst. I need to use multiburst I think. :P I don't know if I tried that. I have one that takes 3 pictures slower and makes them all separate and one that takes 16 really fast and puts them in a grid. Link to example of the 16 burst. (http://tinypic.com/r/2yv4g11/6)

Zoom in and out. Don't know if I should use zoom or just get closer or farther away.

Image Resolution: 6M, 3M, 2M, or VGA. I'm pretty sure it's megapixals, I have it set to 6 but I'm not sure what VGA does. o_O

Image Quality: Good, Better, Best. Obviously it's on best.

Focus Zone: Multi-zone, center, selected area. I have no idea what it does. It has to do with the brackets on the screen, it's set on multizone.

Ev Compensation: No clue on this one either. It's set to 0,0 but it can go a bunch of different ways. I can go down to -0,3 -0,7 -1,0 -1,3 -1, 7 and -2,0. I can go up and get those same numbers except with a plus. It's currently on 0,0.

M-Burst Interval: I can change the 16 burst time! Right now it's on 1/30 Sec. I can choose 1/15 Sec and 1/7.5 Sec.

I have a ton of different stuff under Setup: File No., Digital Zoom, Quick View, Camera Sound, Auto LCD Off, Auto Power Off, Video out, USB Mode, Date Stamp, Date & Time, Language, Image Storage, Format, Reset, Voice Memo, About. Most of those are just on or off.

And then I have scene. Here's all the scenes I can choose from: Auto,P-Mode, Portrait, Night Portrait, Landscape, Sport, Night Landscape, Backlight, Museum, Snow, Sunset, Fireworks, Party, Beach, Copy, Video.

So yeah. Help on settings would be cool, and tons of tips for what I need to do. I was in a photography class at school and I still can't take good pictures. Although all those for school were stationary objects, not live reptiles! ;) Thanks!~ :)

I have pretty much the same set up on my point and shoot. As far as I have deciphered (please correct me if I'm wrong, I'm still learning), I think the settings mean:

macro : I had some trouble "getting it to work" in the beginning. As far as I can tell, some flash modes and programmed settings don't work in macro. You should have an "auto" setting under "scene" options that controls most of the programmable options (ie. ev, flash, white balance)? Macro setting tends to work best in that auto mode, until you figure out the quirks of your camera's settings.

zoom : Try out the zoom in on non-moving targets that give you a good idea of focus and sharpness. I have found that my camera can't focus properly when zoomed in, so I avoid it, or cheat. If you use zoom in, be careful that you don't bump the camera lens against things (they tend to move forward), which I may or may not have done with mine. >.>

One way you can cheat with a point and shoot that's bad at focusing is to set the focus mode to center, hold the shutter button half down like you're beginning to take a shot, but not all the way. In most cameras, that engages the focus. So say I want to focus on something 5 meters away, but my camera fails. I "focus" on something 5.1 meters away with the half held down button, but find that 5.1 meters isn't sharp, but 5 meters is, then before I take the shot (still holding the button half down to keep the focus set), move the camera so it's now cheat focused on my target 5 meters away. That eye balling to judge sharpness is hard to do on the tiny digital screen though.

focus zones : For snakes, probably you'd want to use center focus. Multi focus is good for multiple subjects you want the camera to focus on at different focal lengths (ie. different distances away from the camera). I don't have selected area, so I can't say.

EV compensation : I had to look this one up way back. It stands for exposure value, and it pretty much means color saturation. Try it out on a still scene with lots of different colors and sunlight, and keep all the settings besides EV constant. Start with the lowest setting (-2?) and snap a picture for every setting on up, and you can see the difference. The lower ones tend to look darker, and the highest ones look very bright. It affects different colors differently in different lights. It's useful for when your camera just isn't getting the colors quite right, to play with EV and see what happens. Note that most point and shoot cameras are intentionally designed to reduce blues and increase reds, to produce a "warmer" feel that camera makers have decided their consumers like better than true color.

M burst : Sounds useful for moving shots. I don't have that much control over mine, but I'm going to try the movie mode in burst setting and see what happens. My snake refuses to sit still! I do recommend a tripod or something equivalent for this, or an incredibly steady hand.

Scene : Is the most tricky I think. The scene settings are usually completely individual to the camera model and can affect all the other settings in unexpected ways. Best way to figure these out is experimentation and reading the manual. On my camera for example, I was surprised to find that night settings cranked down the shutter speed a lot. Which would be fine with a tripod and a statue, but not so much for me.

[Hexadeci]

O, I forgot image resolution. I think you're right it's megapixels, and VGA is lowest resolution, since it's supposed to be used for thumbnails and email and such.

[Susan]

I agree with the center focal zone. I would use the little flower (that's macro) and definitely use the zoom. You have to be aware of your focal length/distance (for all the cameras I've used...all point and shoot, in this mode, it's no less than 12 inches) and not be too close to your subject. Use the zoom to bring your image closer, but if you go too far, you won't get good photos either.

[Gemini8910]

Wow thanks for all the tips! :D I'll try them out when I have him out next. :)

[tyflier]

Your exposure compensation has nothing to do with color saturation...

It most likely operates at either 1-stop or 0.3-stop intervals. A "stop" is easiest to think of as a step-difference in light value. A little background info on how a digital camera operates.

Your camera has a built in light meter that reads how much light is coming into the camera. This light meter is designed to trigger your camera to make the scene "neutral grey", which is about 18% reflective. No matter what you take a picture of, your camera wants to make it neutrally reflective. Doesn't matter if it is snow or mud, your camera is trying to make them look the same tone. Obviously, snow is much more highly reflective then mud, and therefor produces a much brighter tone...

As a photographer, the most important job we do is control how much light from the scene is used by the camera. We do this by using aperture, ISO, and shutter speed. Exposure Compensation on a digital camera gives you, the photographer, the ability to tell the light meter how bright or dark or subject is.

Ever take a picture of a fresh blanket of snow, all white and bright, in the new morning sun, just to get inside and find your photo is horribly dark with blackness instead of shadows, and dark, dingy snow? This is your camera making that scene neutral. Use your exposure compensation to tell your camera that this scene is not supposed to be neutral. Set your "exposure value" to a +2 using exposure compensation and take the same picture. Suddenly your snow is bright white, your shadows have details, and that glorious new morning sun is as bright as you remember.

In short, setting your exposure compensation to a positive value tells your camera that this scene should be calculated to be brighter than neutral. Setting your EV to the negative tells your camera the scene should be darker than neutral.

This is how you will be able to control the exposures of your shots. You may not have a specific shutter speed or aperture control on your camera(though you should definitely have an ISO setting somewhere...), but you can still control your light readings using exposure compensation.

As for color saturation...as a matter of science, a darker image will have more saturated colors. Brighter means more light and more reflection, which invariably means colors containing more whiteness. This gives colors a washed-out, almost sun bleached look. Darker tones translate into deeper colors which means they are less reflective, and give off less whiteness, making them full, deep, and saturated with color. Saturation and hue are 2 aspects of an image that can be influenced with exposure compensation, but this is not the purpose of exposure compensation...

I would recommend a quick google search for Ansel Adams and Zone System. This system of visualizing your scene before taking the shot was developed in the 1930's but is every bit as effective, usual, and valid for digital photography.

http://d2f29brjr0xbt3.cloudfront.net/514_anseladams/2.jpg

This took about 3 seconds to find. The middle is neutral, and this is what your camera wants to make everything it sees...

Hope this was somewhat useful...

[tyflier]

Check your owner's manual, and see what your zoom range is. Most have an optical zoom, which functions like a professional zoom lens using movable glass elements to enlarge and focus a scene, and a digital zoom, which using pixel enlargments and extrapolations to digitally enlarge and focus a scene. Your optical zoom range will always produce a better quality image. Digital zooms will quickly deteriorate your image quality. I avoid using the digital zoom range every time I use a P&S camera.

Macro--this term is often not completely understand. This mode on your camera does nothing more than manipulate the lens elements to decrease your minimum focusing range. Every lens has a minimum distance that front element must be from the subject in order to focus. For most general-use lenses, this has always been around 2.5-3 feet. A "Macro Mode" on a P&S digital camera will typically use an internal focusing lens that cuts that minimum focusing distance in half allowing you to get the front of your camera much closer to the flower/bee/spider/whatever, and still get crisp focus.

"P-Mode" is program mode, and in this mode you absolutely should have access to and control over your shutter speed, aperture, and ISO settings. Not sure how, and every camera is different, but there ain't no point in giving the consumer a program option if there is no way to make the adjustments...

[tyflier]

Focus zones--Multiple zones will not, and cannot, give you multiple points of focus. It gives you multiple points within the scene that the camera can choose to focus on, but only one of those points will be selected for focus. A camera can't "focus" on more than one element in the scene. You can use depth of field to expand the effective focal depth, but the camera can only physically focus on one element at one distance.

Right now it may seem a matter of semantics, but in practice, it will be very frustrating at the very least, trying to focus on 2 different objects in a scene with a very short depth of field.

Scene Settings--These are actually fairly standardized these days. Portrait, indoors, sport, mountain, water, beach, night...These scene modes are set to give priority to specific aspects of the exposure. Some examples...

Sports--This mode will give priority to shutter speed. Why? because faster shutter speeds are needed to capture the movement of sport. So in this mode, your camera will open up the aperture and sacrifice depth of field as well as increase the ISO and sacrifice noise quality, all in an effort to produce the fastest shutter speed obtainable based on the light readings. Each camera company may have it's own idea what the ideal shutter speed is for this mode, but they all function the same way.

Portrait--This will typically set your camera to a wide open aperture and a very low ISO. Why? Because in portraits, the goal is high-quality, sharp focusing, and soft backgrounds. Open apertures give you a narrow depth of field creating softer backgrounds, and low ISO settings produce the highest image quality by introducing the lowest possible level of digital noise.

Mountain--This is your landscape setting. This setting will set the camera to use a very narrow aperture for maximum depth of field. It will also require very low ISO settings to produce the highest quality resolution and details. It will sacrifice shutter speed to achieve these goals. Use a tripod in this mode.

"Scene Modes" tell the camera what you are looking at so it can automatically choose nominal settings that will work under general conditions for the type of scene depicted. Your "Snow Scene" will set your EV Compensation at +2 so your snow is nice and bright. Inside and night time scenes will increase your ISO to make your sensor more sensitive to light, allowing you to take photos in darker-than-normal situations.

In the end...I would recommend some google reading on basic photography techniques and camera operations. And get OLD information. Digital cameras still function on the same principles and techniques as the earliest cameras. The information easily translates to digital, and can be very useful for improving your shots...

[tyflier]

I wanted to give you a quick explanation of another feature found on most digital cameras today. Most have a selectable metering area. This means the user can choose how the light meter reads the scene in front of it. There are 3 standard modes:

Average--This mode of light metering takes into account the light coming from every area within the scene, makes an average reading, and sets your exposure value(aperture + shutter speed + ISO = exposure value) based on that average.

Center-Weighted--This mode takes the average light reading, but weights the center value of the scene stronger than the outlying areas. In other words, the light coming from the middle of the scene is more important in determining the exposure value(EV), but all the light is considered.

Spot--This mode takes it's light reading from the central spot of the scene, and ignore the remaining light values. This, in my opinion, is the most useful metering mode, and I'll explain why...

When using the Zone System to visualize a scene(B&W or color, the tones are the same), I use Spot Metering, and visualize the zone I see in the center of the scene. I compare what I see to what I know to be neutral in my mind, and I set my Exposure Compensation to tell my light meter where that center light falls within the zone system. Positive stops tell the camera it is brighter than neutral, negative stops tell the camera it is darker than neutral.

If I make an accurate assessment of the scene, and I expose the center of the scene for the correct tonal value within the zone system, my image should come out with a perfect exposure. Again, ignore colors. We are talking about brightness and darkness...tonal values, not color values. Doesn't matter if it is a green, blue, or red, it's tone is what we are looking at.

Until you have a working understanding of the zone system, this can get confusing. Center-Weighted metering is usually quite accurate. Use it and play with your exposure compensation. Check your results, and you will slowly start to figure it out.

If I confused you with all this...I apologize. If I excited you to try to learn it, excellent. If you got questions or want clarity, don't hesitate to ask. I LOVE photography as both an art and a science...

[Hexadeci]

Any tips about flash with point and shoot? I know they aren't the greatest in general, but I'm trying to make do with what I've got for now, and what I've got is a point and shoot whose flash always washes out any picture. But I have to use flash to get a crisp image of that small, moving scaly subject. Any ideas, pre- or post- processing? I haven't had much luck with post processing away the whiteness, which I assume is due mostly to the data in the photo being lost in the washing out (there's only so much you can do with what doesn't exist).

I've tried taping tissue paper over the flash emitter in a novice attempt at diffusion, but not much success.

Here's an example of my pain:
165017

Image is of my caramel yearling in blue, flash strobe, taken in doors in not enough light to get decent clarity without flash, spot metering, ISO 160 (automatic), white balance set to match artificial light (makes little difference with the flash on), default EV (+0).

[Hexadeci]

Your exposure compensation has nothing to do with color saturation...

Ah, technically I probably misspoke. I'm still learning all the real terminology, so when I said color saturation I probably meant "brightness" as used in common circles and not so much the actual technical meaning. Rather like the way most people think "binary" is something rather different than what programmers and related technical knowledge mean. My bad. I didn't consider a dark image to be color "saturated" since I was viewing black in the same category of white (as "lack of color"). So I thought of a picture taken in shadow and a picture washed out by the sun to be about the same level of unsaturated (though opposite white balance).

I've been playing with varying EV in my photos, but I'm having trouble applying it to my snake photos, since none of the settings seem to matter once my flash has gone and washed everything out in white. :(

[tyflier]

For simple flash diffusion, you can cut a piece of plastic from a gallon-size milk jug and tape it to the side of your camera in front of the flash. The thick, semi-opaque plastic should soften your flash considerably.

You could also try cutting a small piece of white poster board, and secure it under you flash, but angled up in front of it. This should block the forward flash altogether, but aim it towards the ceiling. It will bounce off the ceiling and hit your subject from overhead.

Either method should give you much softer shadows and a more even exposure.

[tyflier]

Ah, technically I probably misspoke. I'm still learning all the real terminology, so when I said color saturation I probably meant "brightness" as used in common circles and not so much the actual technical meaning. Rather like the way most people think "binary" is something rather different than what programmers and related technical knowledge mean. My bad. I didn't consider a dark image to be color "saturated" since I was viewing black in the same category of white (as "lack of color"). So I thought of a picture taken in shadow and a picture washed out by the sun to be about the same level of unsaturated (though opposite white balance).

I've been playing with varying EV in my photos, but I'm having trouble applying it to my snake photos, since none of the settings seem to matter once my flash has gone and washed everything out in white. :(
I'm sorry, I wasn't trying to come off as arrogant or snotty, or anything. I just didn't want anyone reading to be further confused later, so I wanted to clarify. Sorry if I came off harsh.

[nmoore601]

I'm glad I read this. I'm going to experiment. This was one of the most beneficial posts I've read here in a long time. Good stuff.

[Ana Sofia R]

Forget all that different and confusing setup. You wont need any.
VGA is the worst quality! Its doesn't reach even 1mp xD Like the oldest phones with cameras. 6mp is obviously the best choice.
With a compact camera with no flash its hard to take a frozen photo. Unless you're outside with a lot of sun light x) That's why it looks dragged.
so take with flash. I supose that won't appened again.
One more thing... your camera only reach burst time at 1/30 Sec ? thats the Velocity of the shoot... and 1/30 is too slow! if your camera only reach that, take always with flash. You can try in everything... if you take a picture to someone moving, that person will be dragged x) But if the snake it quiet, go on without flash! and try not to tremble :P

Hope it help. Good luck