A few months ago I received a gift: a boxed set of digital photography books. I have owned many different digital photography books in the past, but these books were different in the way they were written. The books made digital photography, and photography in general, easier to understand to the point where I started to take more good pictures than bad ones.

A Different Take On Writing About Digital Photography

In case you were wondering, the boxed set was called: Scott Kelby’s Digital Photography Boxed Set, Volumes 1, 2, and 3. If you would like to become better at taking digital photos, I highly recommend that you purchase this set of three books. Regardless of whether you are new to digital photography, or experienced, you will find learn new as you read through these books.

The one thing that makes these books stand out is that fact that they aren’t long-winded. Each page is short, contains a photograph of the topic at the top, and a few paragraphs that explain the topic. Each page covers a single topic, and is very easy to read. Scott doesn’t go into confusing details about how to take a great photo – he just tells you how to do it. Many books would go into detail about setting the aperture, shutter speed, and ISO for taking a specific photo, but Scott would just tell you what settings you should use without the extra long-winded explanation.

Scott also tries to add a little humour to some of the topics to keep the lessons interesting. While it isn’t over the top, it does keep you wanting to read more. At the end of each book, there are example shots that he has taken, and below each picture he explains – in step-like-form – how he took each of the shots. This allows you to understand what you need to do to take a similar photo.

Very large books have been written to help with understanding digital photography. Scott’s books, however, are just over 200 pages each. Since each page isn’t very long, it won’t take you long to read through each one. Another reason there are three books is because he covers many different subjects throughout all three books. Everything from portraits, group shots, weddings, sports photography, and photography equipment are explained through the three books.

The first volume sets the stage for the next two. By starting with volume one, you begin to understand the basics of digital photography. The first chapter doesn’t go into introducing you to apertures, shutter speeds, or equipment, but rather how to get tack-sharp photos – something everyone who takes photos would probably like to learn. The chapters for the first volume are self-expanatory:

1. Pro Tips for Getting Really Sharp Photos
2. Shooting Flowers Like a Pro
3. Shooting Weddings Like a Pro
4. Shooting Landscapes Like a Pro
5. Shooting Sports Like a Pro
6. Shooting People Like a Pro
7. Avoiding Problems Like a Pro
8. Taking Advantage of Digital Like a Pro
9. Taking Travel & City Life Shots Like a Pro
10. How to Print Like a Pro and Other Cool Stuff
11. Photo Recipes to Help You Get “The Shot”

As you can see there are many topics discussed in volume 1 alone. Volume 2 continues to build from that with the following chapters:

1. Using Flash Like a Pro
2. Building a Studio from Scratch
3. Shooting Portraits Like a Pro
4. Shooting Landscapes Like a Pro
5. Shooting Weddings Like a Pro
6. Shooting Travel Like a Pro
7. Shooting Macro Like a Pro
8. Pro Tips for Getting Better Photos
9. More Photo Recipes to Help You Get “The Shot”

Between the first two volumes, you can easily see that there are many topics discussed – many topics that you would probably be interested in learning. Still, there is one more volume that covers the following:

1. Using Flash Like a Pro, Part 2
2. Using Your Studio Like a Pro
3. The Truth About Lenses
4. Shooting Products Like a Pro
5. Shooting Outdoors Like a Pro
6. Shooting People Like a Pro
7. Shooting Sports Like a Pro
8. Pro Tips for Getting Better Photos
9. Avoiding Problems Like a Pro
10. Yet Even More Photo Recipes to Help You Get “The Shot”

While many topics may seem to be repeated throughout several of the books, each one provides even more tips to help make you a better photographer.

If you would like to take better digital photos, and you would like a straight-forward approach to doing so, I highly recommend you pickup a copy of Scott Kelby’s Digital Photography Boxed Set, Volumes 1, 2, and 3. You won’t regret it.

See larger image Scott Kelby's Digital Photography Boxed Set, Volumes 1, 2, and 3 (Paperback) By (author) Scott Kelby List Price: $67.50 USD New From: $38.49 In Stock Used from: $40.90 In Stock

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Unlike JPEG files, however, there are many drawbacks to using RAW files, and most who use digital cameras probably won’t want to use this format. The more experienced photographers, on the other hand, may love what RAW has to offer.

Proprietary format.

Let’s start the discussion by talking about the fact that there isn’t a standard RAW file format. Each camera manufacturer create their own RAW format, so there isn’t one standard format. In fact, a camera manufacturer may produce a different RAW format for each camera they produce – so even a manufacturer won’t use a single format standard among their products.

This causes headaches for the consumer because if they upgrade their camera, the software they were using to edit their previous RAW photos may not be updated enough to edit their new camera’s RAW format.

Larger file sizes than JPEG files.

A RAW file is much larger than an equivalent JPEG file – I’m talking about 2 to 6 times larger. This has a drawback in that a digital camera can’t take as many pictures per second with a RAW file compared to a JPEG due to the fact that it must save more data. The benefit of a larger file size is that there is a lot more data within a RAW file than a JPEG.

With the size and price of memory cards, storage space for larger RAW files shouldn’t be a big issue.

Need specialized software to edit a RAW file.

Since RAW files have no common standard, not all photo editors are capable of editing RAW files. With each new RAW format created by a camera manufacturer, an update to the photo editor may be needed.

The good news is that cameras that can shoot the RAW format usually include software that can edit the files. While the included software isn’t as robust at Photoshop, or another large photo editor, the included software does do a good job. Software packages such as Photoshop tend to support more RAW formats through various updates.

Can’t print RAW files.

JPEG files are supported by any print shop in the world, but none of those printers support RAW files. You will first need to convert the RAW files to a support file format, such as JPEG, before the photo can be printed.

Minimalist settings applied.

The one benefit that a RAW file has over a JPEG file is that the settings specified in the camera aren’t applied to the image. Why is this a benefit? If you had the wrong color balance set in the camera when you take the picture, you can easily change it on your computer with a RAW file very easy without any degradation in quality. For JPEGs, you would need to remove the color cast through much editing and possible degradation.

Also, if you shoot black and white, the JPEG files will not contain any RGB color information. For RAW files, all that color information is retained in the RAW image, so you can always print that image in color or black and white. The black and white setting in your camera is applied to the JPEG file, not the RAW file.

More overhead for editing.

As discussed in my previous post, a JPEG file contains 8-bits per color channel of data for each pixel. RAW files can contain 10-, 12-, or 14-bits of data per channel of color data. This provides an enormous amount of overhead for editing. This overhead helps to prevent any color banding in the image.

Another benefit is with regards to sharpening. With JPEGs, sharpening is done in-camera, which means that it becomes a one-size-fits-all method of sharpening. Since RAW files haven’t been sharpened in the camera, you can then sharpen the image in your photo editor any way you like. This can also help reduce the noise that can occur because of unwanted sharpening.

Recover some data.

If you have a small amount of blown highlights in your image, you can’t recover them very easily with a JPEG file. With RAW files, however, there is still a chance that those highlights can be recovered because of the amount of data that is stored in the file. While you can’t work miracles with some really bad images, for minor issues, you may be able to save your work.

While the above points do provide advantages and disadvantages for using RAW files, not all digital cameras support this format so you may not have a choice. The RAW file format is not for everyone, but if you do like to edit photos and have a camera that can shoot RAW files, then you may want to give it a try.

In addition, some cameras have the ability to shoot both RAW and JPEG files with each picture that is taken. This provides the best of both worlds, but it does use up more storage space on your memory card.

Are there any other points that can be added to the above list? Which format do you prefer to use, JPEG, RAW, or both?

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While I have written many posts about both JPEG and Raw image formats, I decided to dedicate an entire post to each one, to sort of provide a more comprehensive description of each. After reading the two posts, hopefully you will determine which format best suits your needs.

The most common file format in use.

The JPEG file format has been around for many years, and is support by every image editor and web browser on the market. It is also supported by every digital camera, and any video camcorder that can also take pictures. Every digital photo print shop also supports the JPEG standard. If you want a universal image format, the JPEG format is the one to choose.

Smaller file size.

One aspect of the JPEG file format that has made it so popular is the fact that it doesn’t take up much storage space. This was important years ago when hard drives were much smaller, and the Internet connection speeds were much slower.

Today, digital cameras that are set to save JPEGs can save them much faster than when using the Raw format since their smaller size means camera’s can write the JPEG to the memory card much quicker than Raw files.

There are, however, a few downsides to compressing JPEGs, which I explain below.

Compression discards some data.

One of the downsides to the small files size is the type of compression that is used. The compression algorithm is “lossy”, which means data is discarded when the file is compressed. For the most part, however, you won’t notice any loss of data – unless you start to edit the file.

JPEG files contain 8-bits (256 tones) of data for red, green, and blue. This provides 16.7 million colours. While this is more than enough for viewing the photo, it can be limiting once you start editing and adjust the colours. With enough changes, you will start to see banding in the histrogram of the image. Banding occurs when there are no pixels values in some of the tonal values, and looks comb-like in the histrogram.

Digital camera’s sold today have the ability to capture 10-,12-,14-bits of data which provides more overhead for editing.

Artifacts can appear with more compression.

For the most part, you want to use as little compression as possible with your JPEG files. The more compression you use, the more artifacts may appear. These usually look like “smudges” in the image, and can really reduce the quality of the image. When saving JPEG images for printing, I usually set the compression level to the highest quality setting, which creates a great image without any artifacts.

No editing required to print.

If you aren’t into photo editing, and would just like to print your images, you can do so without converting to another file format. JPEG files can be printed directly from your camera without first editing the pictures.

Processed within the camera.

The one downside to the point above, is that all the settings from the digital camera have already been applied to the JPEG. This can be a downside if, for example, you had the wrong colour balance set, then your digital pictures would have a colour cast to them. As mentioned above, while you could edit the photos to remove the colour cast, you may also have issue with banding. With JPEGs you must ensure all the settings in your camera are accurate for what you want to produce. With black-and-white settings in the camera, you lose all colour information when using JPEG files.

In my next post, I will look at the advantages and disadvantages of using Raw files.

Which file format do you use, and why?

What other points regarding JPEG files can be added to the above list?

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For the most part, I usually hand hold my cameras when taking pictures. It is easier to move around chasing my boys while hand-holding the camera than keeping it on a tripod. At the same time, I have also started to look into taking photos of still life, and eventually want to look into landscape photography. During my experimenting I have learned about some points that will help make sure I take tack-sharp photos.

How to Get Sharp Photos

Below are a list of points that you can use to ensure you photos always come out their sharpest.

Use a tripod.

This is probably the most common tip when trying to get your photos the sharpest. Hand-holding your camera can easily affect the sharpness because your camera can move when you take the picture, especially if you use a slow shutter speed. If you want a sharp photo, you should always use a tripod.

Use a remote cable shutter release or self-timer.

In addition to use a tripod, you should also invest in a remote cable that you can use to control your shutter. This cable simple connects to your camera, and contains a button that controls the shutter, much like the one on your camera. This means that you can take the picture without physically handling the camera. You can also use a wireless shutter release for even more flexibility. If you don’t have a remote release, you can always set the self-timer on your camera and then stand back until it takes the picture.

Switch to a smaller aperture.

While opening up your aperture to say f2.8 will allow you to increase the shutter speeds, it also provides a shallow depth of field. This means only a small area around the focus will be sharp, while all other areas in the photo will be blurred. This is great for singling out an object, but if you want sharpness throughout the photo, decrease your aperture to f22. Of course, this will mean your shutter speed will be much slower, but you are using a tripod, right?

Reduce the ISO setting.

A higher ISO allows you to use faster shutter speeds in low light. As you increase the ISO, the less light you need, however, you also develop more noise in your image. The noise is coloured pixels that are visible when you zoom in on the photo. If you print large photos, the noise may be noticeable. This can also have an effect on sharpness as well, especially if the camera uses a strong noise reduction algorithm. You should reduce the ISO to the lowest setting if you want to make you images the sharpest then can be.

Disable the image stabilizer.

This is one tip I didn’t know about until I read it in several articles. With the image stabilizer, vibration reduction, or whatever it is called with your camera, activated on your lens, it will begin to search for movement in your photo. If there is no movement, since you are making all effect to avoid the camera movement, the image stabilizer may cause slight movement in the camera as it operates. When using a tripod, you should disable the image stabilizer on your camera.

Enable mirror lockup.

This point are for those that want to squeeze every bit of sharpness out of their photo. When you take a digital photo on a DSLR, the mirror inside the camera flips up and out of the way. This exposes the digital image to the sensor. When the mirror flips up, it can cause a small vibration within the camera which can result in a less than sharp photo, especially with very slow shutter speeds. To avoid such a problem, DSLRs provide a setting called “mirror lockup” that will move the mirror out of the way before the taking the photo. Pressing the shutter button once will lockup the mirror, and you press the shutter button second time to take the photo.

The above list provides some good points you can use to get the most sharpness from your digital photos. If you haven’t tried some of the above options, give them a try and see if the sharpness of you photos improve. While you shouldn’t use the above settings all the time, for those moments when you are using a slow shutter speed and need all the sharpness your camera and lens can provide, the above list will help.

See larger image Scott Kelby's Digital Photography Boxed Set, Volumes 1, 2, and 3 (Paperback) By (author) Scott Kelby List Price: $67.50 USD New From: $38.49 In Stock Used from: $40.90 In Stock

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Much like the camera I had back then, many digital cameras include the option of choosing between the two formats. There is a great debate about which format is better, and why you should choose one over the other. In this post I will add my two cents to the debate and allow you to choose.

The Digital Formats

I have discussed the Raw and JPEG formats in various posts in the past. A post titled What is a Digital Raw File? provides a brief overview of that format, while I talk about the JPEG format in the post Overview of Various Image File Formats. There are many differences between the two formats, which will help you to choose which format to use.

The JPEG format is the most popular format that is currently supported by every digital photo camera. It is also the standard photo format online, and has been around for many years. All photo and image editors provide support for the JPEG format.

The JPEG format is compressed, so each file is very small, especially compared to other formats such as TIFF. To create such as small file, some information is lost during the compression. At a low compression (larger file), there is some data loss, but not enough where you really notice a difference. At a higher compression, the data loss and quality of the image begin to be seen.

The Raw format is not supported by all cameras. This format can be found in the digital SLRs (DSLRs) and some point-and-shoot cameras. This is a proprietary format that requires special software to open the Raw file, which also means you can’t simply send someone a file and have them view the photo. Raw files are simply the raw data returned by the camera sensor without any processing by the digital camera.

Unlike JPEGs, Raw files may or may not be compressed. This makes them much larger than a JPEG file. The upside to such a larger file is that they don’t have any loss of data when they are saved to the memory card, and usually contain 10-,12-, or 14-bits of data. This provides much more headroom for editing.

Now from the quick descriptions above, you may not be able to choose a file format to use. Let me help you with this choice.

Which to Choose?

The choice between the two formats can be made, if you determine what you would like to do with your photos.

You should choose the Raw format if you agree with the following statements:

• I like to have total editing control of my photos, such as the colour, sharpening, and contrast.

• I have a lot of storage space, so file size isn’t an issue for me.
• I want the best quality photo from my camera.
• I have no issue with the format being proprietary, as long as future applications support the format from my camera.

You should choose JPEGs if you agree with the following statements:

• I’m not interested in editing my photos.
• I don’t want to worry about format compatibility, such as when sending a photo in an e-mail, or uploading an image.
• I like to print my photos directly from my memory card.
• I don’t have a large amount of storage, so I don’t like large digital photo files.

For the average person that takes photos with a digital camera, you should choose JPEGs. For those that like to have total control over the look of their image, Raw may suit their needs better.

For me, I choose both as my camera, the Rebel Xsi, has the option to save both a Raw file and JPEG of each photo. This increases the amount of storage space, however, I now get the best of both worlds.

Whichever format you choose, just remember that the choice is yours.

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The one option that I do miss, however, is the ability to take RAW digital photos. I always liked editing my images before printing, and RAW photos allowed me to do that better than JPEGs. Recently I stumbled upon a utility that will allow my S3 to take RAW photos as well as change other previously unavailable settings.

LifeHacker

I like to visit LifeHacker once in a while because they provide information on useful applications, tips, and general information. I have found several useful tools on that web site.

While searching the LifeHacker web site (I can’t remember the search terms), I came across a page titled Turn Your Point-and-Shoot into a Super-Camera, and was immediately intrigued. At first I thought would just provide a list of tips on taking pictures, but soon realized there was much more to it.

In the article, the author explains how to use a development kit to unlock many of the settings found within a Canon camera. I should mention that this development kit is only for Canon-made cameras. This development kit is called CHDK.

CHDK (Canon Hacker’s Development Kit)

The CHDK is an open source project that is designed as a firmware enhancement for a Canon digital camera. Unlike traditional firmware changes, CHDK is not permanent (turning off the camera resets your camera), and is non-destructive (no changes to the camera’s firmware).

Installing CHDK is a matter of visiting the CHDK web site, downloading a zip file, and copying the two files within the zip file onto the root directory of your memory card. To uninstall CHDK, simply delete the two files from your memory card. The article mentioned earlier describes how to install and use CHDK.

I tried out the kit and was able to get it working without issues on my S3. I was amazed at the fact that I was able to take RAW pictures. The only problem was that the RAW files weren’t the same as the Canon RAW files, so Adobe Camera RAW couldn’t identify them. There are other RAW converters on the market that can read the CHDK RAW files. I’ll look into them to see how the RAW images turn out. In the meantime, I can also now capture both a RAW and JPEG image at the same time.

Besides the RAW images, CHDK also allows me to change the live histogram (I can now have coloured histograms), take time-lapse photography, and even play games (although I probably won’t play any games with my camera). It also has the ability to change the maximum and minimum shutter speeds on my digital camera.

I’m not sure about how it affects the warranty of the camera, as it doesn’t make any permanent change to the camera, however, I am using the camera outside of the manufacturer’s recommended usage. The warranty on my camera has expired anyway, so I decided to try it out.

If you have a Canon digital camera, and your model is supported by CHDK, you can give it a try if you want. As I mentioned it isn’t permanent, and it does provide you with many more options that are unavailable within the default camera’s firmware.

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Taking pictures of kids on the swings requires a bit more effort than simply taking pictures of a stationary individual. As I watched the man, I thought about the many settings on his camera he could change to take the picture he was hoping for. I will talk about those settings in this post.

Setting the Scene

Before I go into detail about taking action shots, let me set the scene that I had described above. As mentioned it was outdoors and it was a cloudy day. Although not raining, the clouds did provid a darker than usualy setting at times.

It was midday, around 1 o’clock, so the sun was high in the sky (behind the clouds). I do like taking pictures on a cloudy day because the light from the sun is not as bright, which doesn’t create any harsh shadows. Had it been sunny, however, it would have been much easier to take action shots as a faster shutter speed would have been used by the automatic setting on the camera. This was not the case on this day.

The Camera Settings

The biggest setting that you need to pay attention to when taking pictures of a moving subject is the shutter speed. Depending on the speed of the subject, you would need a shutter speed of at least 1/250 of a second. For many cameras on a cloudy day, it could be hard to achieve this shutter speed by default on the automatic settings. The following points list some setting changes you can make in your camera to increase the shutter speed:

1. Open up the aperture. Many digital cameras allow you to set the aperture before taking a picture. If this is the case with your camera, open it up. For those that don’t know, the aperture is expressed as a decimal number, such as 2.7, 8.0, etc. on you camera. By decreasing the number, you are actually making the aperture larger, meaning you are letting in more light. This will allow you to increase your shutter speed.
2. Don’t zoom in on your subject, walk closer instead. When you use the zoom on your camera, the aperture will actually close down, which is the opposite of what you want to do. Instead, zoom all the way out and walk closer to your subject to allow you to use the largest possible aperture on your camera.
3. Increase the ISO. All digital cameras have several ISO numbers that you can choose. The larger the number, the more sensitive to light your camera becomes. This allows you to take pictures in a darker setting without using the flash. Keep in mind that the larger the ISO value the more noise you will get in your pictures. For my camera I notice ISO 400 produces too much noise, but ISO 200 provides a nice balance.
4. Avoid the flash. This is more for point-and-shoot cameras that can only use the built-in flash. On my camera, when I use the built in flash, then camera always uses a 1/60 of a second shutter speed, which is way to slow to capture the action. Take pictures with your flash on and look at the shutter speed. If it is too slow, don’t use the flash for action shots.
5. Increase the shutter speed. If you have changed the settings mentioned above, then you should be able to increase the shutter speed. I recommend you set your camera on aperture-priority mode (if your camera includes that settings), and then let the camera choose the shutter speed.

The above settings can be changed in most digital cameras to help you take action shots outdoors. Many of the settings can also be used to take pictures indoors without a flash.

In case you were wondering, I didn’t mention these tips to the man having trouble taking the photos.

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In this post I will provide some tips that have helped me through the last few years, and hopefully they will help you.

Camera Settings

Most people that take pictures usually keep the camera on full Auto, meaning they just take the photo, download and print it. I don’t mind the Auto setting, but I prefer to make a few camera settings.

• Digital cameras usually have a white balance setting. Change this setting to match the lighting conditions:
  • For sunny and cloudy days I change this setting to “Cloudy”. Some DSLRs also have a “Shade” setting that you can also use.
  • For indoor shots with regular incandescent lights, choose the “Tungsten” setting if are not using the flash.
  • If you are using the flash in low-light situations, change the white balance to “Flash”.
  • When there are multiple light sources each with different light sources, use a gray card and the custom white balance to hopefully get more accurate colours.
• If you shoot in RAW mode, you can leave your camera on “Auto”, and then change the white balance in a software RAW converter on your computer.
• Set the JPEG settings to the highest quality. Memory cards get cheaper over time, so if you don’t have enough space for the larger JPEGS, get a larger memory card.
• Set the ISO to the lowest value, which will reduce the noise in your photos making them more clear. Under certain conditions, you may need to increase the ISO (see below).
• If you digital camera has a viewfinder, use that to take pictures and turn off the LCD screen. This will conserve battery power as the LCD screen is one of the biggest battery power hogs in a digital camera.

Once you have made the necessary settings, you can now take the pictures.

Taking the Pictures

For sunny outdoor photos:

• Avoid having your subjects face into the sun if you can to reduce squinting.
• If the subject is wearing a hat, have them take it off for the picture. If not, and you get a dark shadow on their face from the hat; use your flash to brighten up the face. This is known as “fill flash”.
• I find a polarizer helps reduce reflections, and increases contrast and colour in photographs taken on sunny days. A polarizer is a cover that is screwed in front of the lens.

For cloudy days:

• Increase the ISO value of you camera to increase the shutter speed if the speed is slower than 1/30 of a second.
• If you need to, use your flash to provide additional light to the scene.

For low-light conditions:

• Use a tripod is always the recommended solution when shooting low-light photographs. If your camera is able to use a cable release, then use it to avoid camera shake. If not, simply set the timer on your camera, stand back and wait for the picture to be taken.
• If you want to avoid using the flash, you can increase the ISO to see if you can get a fast enough shutter speed (1/30 or a second or faster).
• Don’t use the zoom feature to get a larger aperture and a faster shutter speed. If you need to get closer, then walk towards the subject.
• If you do need to use the flash, then ensure you aren’t more than ten feet way from the subject as that is the distance of most camera’s built-in flash. You also don’t want to get too close or the subject will become bright white from the flash.

Taking pictures of children can be a challenge to say the least. They are constantly moving and won’t sit still for very long for you to take a picture. My advice is, just let them be kids.

I find that the best pictures of children are the ones where they aren’t sitting still and posing for the camera. I like the natural look of photographs of kids at play. In situations like that, I usually get down to their level to get a more natural looking photograph. If they are sitting on the floor, then sit with them, or even lie down to get lower.

If a child is shy in front of the camera, play with them for a bit to get them to smile and have fun and they may not even you noticing you taking the pictures. The end result will be you getting natural looking pictures.

If they do approach the camera, for some fun I switch to macro mode and take pictures of them really close to the camera look at the lens. You will definitely get a good laugh at these types of photographs.

Summary

Taking a photograph with a digital camera can be tricky at times. I am not a professional photographer in any way shape or form, but I have learned a few tricks over the past couple of years that have helped me to become a better photographer. I am interested in any tips you may have to share to get better photographs.

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In this post I will look at what exactly a digital Raw file is, what is needed produce a digital photo from a Raw file, and finally the advantages and disadvantages.

A Raw file

In my post titled How Digital Cameras Work I explain how a digital camera captures a scene and processes the information to produce a photo. Also in that post I talk about the camera’s sensor and how a colour filter is used to add the colours to the photos. Understanding camera sensors will help to understand a Raw file since this type of digital format is simply the sensor data saved to a file.

Although there are a few different colour filter arrangements available in digital cameras, a Raw file is simply a grayscale representation of the photo because it records the luminance values of each pixel in the photo. The Raw file does, however, contain colour information from the colour filter, but doesn’t contain anything readable by a human. The job of interpreting the colour is the responsibility of the Raw converter.

The Raw Converter

The colour from a Raw image is obtained by a program called a Raw Converter. For cameras that are able to take Raw pictures, a Raw converter software is included on one of the CDs that came with the camera. There are other converters available such as Capture One and Adobe Camera Raw.

Besides obtaining the colour from a Raw file, the converter does other tasks as well:

1. White Balance – For JPEG files the white balance is set and applied to the digital photo in the camera. Since a Raw file is record of the sensor data, the white balance hasn’t been applied to a Raw file. The white balance setting is simply saved as metadata in the Raw file and can be applied in the converter. You can also change the white balance in the converter if you wish.
2. Interpreting Colour – A Raw file contains luminance values for red, green, and blue values. The converter must then assign a colour value to each pixel based on the luminance values.
3. Gamma Correction – There is complex theory behind gamma, but I won’t go into the details. A Raw file has linear gamma (gamma 1.0), which is much different than the human eye. The job of a converter is to apply gamma correction on the image to redistribute the tonal values to match more closely they a human eye sees light and shade.
4. Sharpening – Similar to white balance, sharpening is usually performed in-camera for JPEG files. For Raw files, no sharpening is applied so this can be done within the converter. For most, however, sharpening the image should be done as the very last step in a digital workflow.

Advantages

Finer Control Over Corrections
As I mentioned in the previous section, you can perform such things as white balance and sharpening after the photo is taken. This allows you to more finely tune the white balance, and perform more targeted sharpening of the image.

More Bits of Colour
For JPEG files, the most bits you can have is 24bits, or 8bits for each red, green, and blue. Raw files, however, can have many more bits. Each file can have 10bits or more for each red, green, and blue value which provides more overhead for editing the photo.

Disadvantages

Processing Time
Unlike JPEGs, you can’t download and print files directly from the camera. These files first need to be converted to a more usable file by a Raw converter, and then saved as another file format, such as JPEG or TIFF before it can be printed.

File Size
A Raw file can be considerably larger than a JPEG file. This is because a JPEG file is compressed while a Raw file may not be. Even if it were compressed, it would still be larger than a JPEG.

Proprietary Format
Each camera manufacturer, and even model for that matter, have a different format Raw file. This is no common format use by all cameras, which means that for newer cameras you would need to wait for one of the third party converters to be updated to allow editing of the Raw files. In an effort to standardize the Raw format, Adobe has created the Digital Negative (DNG) file format, but it has yet to catch on with digital cameras.

Lack of Future Support
The proprietary format of Raw files may not ba around in 10 years time, which can make it an obsolete format. This is obviously a concern for archiving the photos. For those that are worried, just remember that the format won’t be gone in one day, but will probably take years to disappear, and by then you can easily convert the images to another format.

Summary

Camera digital Raw files are proprietary formats that record information directly from the sensor of a digital camera. All processing, such as white balance, gamma correction, and sharpening, is performed in a piece of software called a Raw converter. As with all image formats, the Raw format also has several advantages and disadvantages that should be known before choosing to shoot in Raw.

Related Posts

1. Digital Photos: Should You Use Raw or JPEG?
2. Advantages and Disadvantages of RAW Files
3. Digital Photo Workflow

In this post I will discuss what colour management is, and how best to use it to reproduce the colours in the photos you see on your monitor.

Devices and Colours

If you were to show a thousand people various shades of red and ask each one to point to the true red colour, you will probably get a thousand different answers. Each person has their own opinion on what the colour red looks like. Devices to some degree are no different.

There are many devices that deal with colours: scanners, printers, digital cameras and monitors. If they all displayed the same colour the same way, then there wouldn’t be a problem. Unfortunately, each device displays colours differently so if you were to transfer a picture between two devices, chances are the colours won’t be the same. This is where colour management comes in.

The goal of colour management is to obtain a match of a colour between devices, provided the device is capable of displaying the necessary colour.

In order to get the same colour to display on a device you would first need to calibrate the device. A search on Google for monitor calibration will result in almost two million pages in the search results. There is much discussion on calibrating your monitor. Once you have calibrated a device, you will then have a colour profile that can be associated with that device.

Colour Profiles

Once you calibrate your monitor you can save the information in a file called a colour profile. This file contains information about mapping the colours for that device. Some mappings may provide information about the closest possible colour and remap the entire colour range to allow for different gamuts.

Many of the devices that are used to present specific colours to the user include an ICC colour profile that may be installed along with the drivers and applications. The colour profiles may also be available on the vendor’s Web site or through a third party.

You may need several colour profiles for a particular device to ensure that your colours are as accurate as possible. For example, a photo printer can print a photograph on many different types of paper: glossy, matte, normal printer paper. Each of the paper types reproduce colours differently, and as such will require a separate colour profile for the printer. You may be able to get a profile from the paper manufacturer, or they may suggest a profile to use. Either way, it is best to use a profile specific to that paper type.

In photo editors, there is an option to define the various colour profiles to use for the devices. Make sure you select the colour profile that is associated with each device that you will be using to ensure that your get accurate colours.

When saving your photos, you can embed the ICC colour profile so if someone were to open that photo on a computer without the profile, the colours will still be displayed accurately because the profile information is embedded inside the file. The downside to this is that it makes your image file larger.

Summary

Each device that is used with photographs can display colours differently. To get accurate colours, it is important to use a colour profile for that device. The device’s vendor, or a third party vendor, can provide you with the necessary colour profile for the device. Some devices, such as printers, may require different colour profiles depending on the target output, such as glossy or matter paper.

Related Posts

1. Examples of Colour Management
2. 48bit Image Colour Issues When Saved as JPEG
3. Digital Photo Workflow

Although my file format has changed I still like to tweak my pictures. I do this because I am not the greatest of photographers so I like to make some quick edits to my pictures. In this post I will provide an overview of the workflow I use to make my pictures ready for printing.

Camera Settings

I have my camera setup up differently than most people. You don’t have to setup your camera the same way as mine to use the workflow, but I thought I’d mention this here because it will make your pictures look different.

1. Set the white balance.

   I always try to set the white balance before taking pictures. You can use a gray card if you wish or one of the preset values. For outdoor pictures on a cloudy day or if the pictures are mainly in shade I usually select the “Cloud” setting. For sunny days I will usually use the gray card. When using the flash indoors, I simply select the “Flash” setting.

2. Decrease the contrast.

   All cameras may not allow you to do this, but since mine does I usually decrease this to the lowest setting. I will increase the contrast in my photo editor near the end of my workflow.

3. Decrease the sharpening.

   Digital cameras usually apply sharpening to all the images. I decrease this also as I have much more control over the sharpening in my photo editor.

I have listed the changes I make to my pictures in-camera, but it is up to you on whether you want to implement them. I do recommend you at least try to change the white balance (unless you are confortable with using the automatic setting).

Photo Editing Workflow

Once you have all your pictures on the camera it is time to edit them using the workflow. Before you use the workflow, you must first ensure that you have downloaded them to your computer and have them organized as you wish. I provided tips on this in my post titled How to Organzie Your Digital Photos.

This is the workflow that I use:

1. Make a copy of the picture.

   I always edit a copy of the picture so I don’t accidently damage the original. This way I can always start over if I don’t like my changes. In Photoshop, I would actually make a copy of the background layer in work on the copy.

2. Crop the picture.

   If you are going to be printing the picture at a specific size then you may want to crop the picture. Digital photos aren’t usually the same size as regular print so you will need to do some cropping.

3. Examine and perform an colour corrections.

   At this point take a look at the image. Is there a slight color cast to picture? If there is then correct the colour cast to until you are happy with the look of the picture.

4. Increase the contrast.

   Since I don’t have my camera increase the contrast of the image, I have my photo editor do it. You can increase the contrast of an image many different ways, so choose the way that you are comfortable with.

5. Sharpen the photo.

   Sharpening the photo should be the last editing step in a workflow. Try not to over sharpen the photo as you may get light coloured halos through your picture.

6. Convert to a colour profile.

   This step is optional if you shoot JPEGs as they use the sRGB colour profile. If you use RAW photos and one of the larger profiles such as Adobe RGB (1998) then you may want to convert to the sRGB profile. I personally convert to the profile of the printer that will print my photos, and have had great success with doing this.

7. Save the photo.

   Now you must save your picture to a location on your hard drive that is different than your original. Save the image as a JPEG with as minimal compression as possible. This will provide a larger file, but will provide a better quality photo.

That is my entire workflow, at least a brief overview. I tried to keep it general so you can use this workflow with any photo editor.

Summary

In this post I have explained the setting I use in my camera as well as the workflow I use to make my photos. There are many different workflows on the Internet and some provide step-by-step instructions for a specific photo editor. In the end, you will probably come up with your own workflow that works for you.

Related Posts

How to Organize Your Digital Photos
Organizing Digital Archives
Tips on Taking Photographs with a Digital Camera
Converting Digital Photos for E-mail or Web

Related Posts

1. Converting Digital Photos for E-mail or the Web
2. What is a Digital Raw File?
3. Tips on Taking Photographs with a Digital Camera

In this post I will explain how to take pictures indoors without the use of a flash. I’m not a professional photographer by any means, but I have learned a few things that I’m sure will help you.

Shutter Speed and Aperture

Before explaining how to take indoor pictures, it is important to determine what affects the camera brightness. As I explained in the post title How Digital Cameras Work I noted that a digital camera takes black and white pictures using the brightness of an image. There are two things that affect the brightness of a picture: the shutter and aperture.

The shutter within your digital camera rapidly opens and closes. When a picture is taken, the shutter opens for a specific amount of time and then closes. When it opens, light enters the camera and is registered by the sensor. The speed of the shutter determines how much light is registered. Fast shutter speeds such as 1/250th and 1/500th of a second doesn’t let in as much light as slow shutter speeds such as 1/30th and 1 second.

In order to get a bright enough picture at faster shutter speeds, the camera must have a larger opening to let light in. This opening is called the aperture. When you use a faster shutter speed, the opening is larger to let more light in, then when you use a slower shutter speed. Aperture size is measure in f-stops. You camera may show the aperture as 2.7, 4 or 8. The larger the number the smaller the aperture, so an aperture of 2.7 lets in more light than an aperture of 8.

Keep this in mind as we will be explaining how this is used in the next section.

Lights, Camera, Take Picture

As mentioned above both shutter speed and aperture determine the amount of light that enters your camera. How do we use this information when taking indoor pictures?

The first thing to keep in mind is that it can be difficult to hold a camera steady with a slower shutter speed than 1/30th of a second. If your camera shows a slower shutter speed than 1/30th of a second, try to allow more light into the room. This can be done by simply opening the curtains or turning on a light. If you still can’t get a faster shutter speed, then open up the aperture.

When you zoom in the aperture closes down, so to increase your aperture simply zoom all the way out. If you need to zoom, then move closer to your subject. This will allow you to keep a larger opening while filling your frame with your subject.

What happens if you still can’t get a faster shutter speed? There is one more thing to try.

Increasing the ISO

Film comes in various ISO numbers such as ISO 100, ISO 400 and ISO 800. The larger the ISO number the more sensitive the film is to light. Even though digital cameras don’t use film, you can still change the ISO number within your camera. This has the same effect as film.

Find out how to change the ISO number on your digital camera and increase it to the next number. Try to take the picture again and check to see if the shutter speed is fast enough for you to take the picture. If it is, then you can keep it at that number. If it isn’t, then increase the number again. Most digital cameras can allow you to go up to ISO 800, while many of the DSLR cameras allow you to go as high as ISO 3200 or even ISO 6400.

There is, however, one thing to point out when increasing the ISO number. There is a trade off between allowing you to take pictures in darker conditions and picture clarity. When you increase the ISO on your digital camera, you sill start to see noise in your pictures. The noise looks like little coloured pixels. If you only print photos at 4×6, then the noise won’t be as noticeable then if your were to print a 8×10. It’s up to you on whether the noise matters to you.

Summary

In this post I have provided a quick explanation on shutter speed and aperture settings. I have provided tips on taking indoor pictures without a flash including keeping the aperture open and increasing the ISO within your digital camera.

Related Posts

1. How to Capture Action Shots Outdoors
2. Tips for Taking Tack-Sharp Digital Photos
3. Tips on Taking Photographs with a Digital Camera

In this post I will provide an overview of the different formats including their advantages and disadvantages.

GIF Format

I will begin with one of the oldest formats in use on the Internet today. The GIF name is a acronym for Graphics Interchange Format, and was first introduced by Compuserve in 1987. This is a popular format next to the JPEG format and is still used on Web pages today. Digital cameras, however, don’t use this format because it only supports 256 colours.

There are currently two versions of GIF in use: GIF87a (the original version) and GIF89a. The GIF89a version supports multiple images in stream which allows you to create animated GIF images.

Advantages – One advantage to a GIF is that it uses lossless compression to make an image smaller. This means that no image information is lost during compression. It also has the advantage of making one of the colours in the image transparent to allow the background to show through. As mentioned earlier, you can create simple animations by combining multiple images into a single GIF89a file.

Disadvantages – The biggest disadvantage for the GIF file format is that it only supports 256 colours, which isn’t nearly enough for a digital photo. This means that GIF files are restricted to sharp-edged line art (such as logos) that have a limited number of colours.

JPEG Format

This is perhaps the most popular file format used for digital pictures, especially now that all digital cameras store their pictures in this format. Similar to GIF, JPEG is also an acronym for Joint Photographic Experts Group. This group was first formed in 1986, issued a standard in 1992, which was approved in 1994.

Unlike the GIF file format, the JPEG format can compress images that contain up to 16.7 million colours. This is more than enough for a digital photo. Besides the number of colours, another difference between the GIF format and the JPEG format is the type of compression used. While a GIF uses a lossless compress, a JPEG file is compressed using a lossy compression algorithm. This means that each time you save a JPEG file, it loses more information.

Digital cameras may also have the ability to save a picture in the RAW format. This format, however, is a proprietary format that is different between cameras manufacturers, so it isn’t used at all on the Internet. For more information about the JPEG and RAW file formats, please read JPEG or RAW Format.

Advantages – The biggest advantage is the ability to save a digital photo in a very small size (in bytes). Another advantage is that it can save an image that includes up to 16.7 million colours, which is more than enough for a digital picture. It is a very popular format for those two reasons alone.

Disadvantages – The biggest disadvantage is that the compression used in a JPEG image is lossy. Each time you save a JPEG image, the more data you lose. Another disadvantage is that if you compress an image too much, you will get JPEG "artifacts". These look like distorted sections of the images, usually looking like squares. You should minimize the amount of compression of the image, while at the same time managing the size of the file, to reduce these artifacts.

TIFF Format

As with many names in the computer world, the TIFF name is also an acronym. TIFF is short for Tagged Image File Format. This a very popular format for archiving digital photos, mainly because it is widely supported by most image editing programs across many different operating systems.

Similar to the JPEG format, it supports 24-bit (16.7 million) colours. You can even save up to 48-bits of colour information within the file. The trade off is the file size. While JPEG files are compressed, TIFF files are generally uncompressed, which results in very large file sizes. You can, however, compress TIFF files but not to the same size of JPEGs.

Advantages – Since the TIFF file format is supported by pretty much all image editors on many different operating systems, it is the first choice for archiving digital photos. Since TIFFs don’t use compression, at least by default, you can continuously save a TIFF file and never lose any information. When editing photos, it is best to first save the file in a TIFF format during editing, and then JPEG once your are finished.

Disadvantages – The biggest disadvantage for a TIFF file is the size. Compared to JPEGs, TIFF files are enormous. Depending on the bit depth (24 or 48) you are talking 100MB+ for a single file. Although, with the size of hard drives and DVDs it will be worth it to save your photo archives in the TIFF format.

PNG Format

Rounding out the acronym file names is the PNG format, or Portable Network Graphics. This format is similar to the GIF format in that it uses a lossless compression. Years ago there was a patent issue with the compression used for the GIF format, so the PNG format was created to avoid any patent issues. This format is fairly new compared to the other formats since it was introduced in 1996.

One advantage the PNG format has over a GIF is the number of colours it supports. The PNG format supports 24-bit or 16.7 million colours. This means that it can be used as a format for your digital photos. The JPEG format, however, still compresses the file to a much smaller size, and has more support by image applications.

Advantages – One advantage that the PNG has over a GIF is the number of colours. It can support 16.7 million colours, which is the same as a JPEG file. It also uses a lossless compression, which means that you can save your image many times without losing any information.

Disadvantages – Since this format is new compared to the others discussed in this post, it doesn’t have the same amount of support. The older Web browsers will have trouble displaying a PNG image, but the newer browsers should have no problem. Although it can compress a 16.7 million colour photo-quality image, the JPEG file format can still create a smaller file size. If you do want to print your photos from a PNG format, ensure your photo lab supports the PNG format.

Summary

In this post I discussed the most popular image file formats in use today. Each format has its advantages and disadvantages and is suited for specific types of images. Some images are also suited for specific tasks, such as printing and archiving. The formats discussed here can be edited by most image editing software without any problems.

Related Posts

1. The PNG Image Format
2. What is a Digital Raw File?
3. When to Use GIF and JPEG Format

In this post I’ll explain the method I use to organize my digital photos in an easy and efficient manner. I am able to find a specific photo or all photos of someone within a few minutes, if not seconds.

Photo Organizing Software

Before beginning to organize your digital photos, it is important to first get photo organizing software. This type of software usually saves your photo information in a database for quick retrieval. The organizer may also have the ability to backup, edit and print your photos. In this post I’ll just discuss the organizing portion of the software.

There are many applications that are capable of organizing your photo. The following lists some of the most popular.

• Picassa (http://picasa.google.com/) – This is Google’s photos organizer, and many people like to use it. The best part about this software is that it is free.
• ACDSee (http://www.acdsee.com/) – This is one of the oldest photo organizing applications on the market and it has a lot to offer. I currently use a version of this application for organizing my photos.
• iMatch (http://www.photools.com/) – Another great photo organizing application that is also fast.

This is by no means a complete list, but one of these tools should be more than enough to organize your photos. If you find another one that you like to use then by all means use it.

Note: Before purchasing the photo organizing software for the Windows Vista operating system, ensure that it will run on Vista. Some software today may not run on Vista.

Tag Your Digital Photos

All photo organizers today allow you to tag your digital photos. When you tag a photo all you are really doing is assigning descriptive words to a photo. When you then select that word, you will be able to see all pictures that contain that tag. This is the most important task to do when organizing your photos.

Tags assigned to a digital photo can be as general or specific as you like them to be. For example, you can assign a picture with a tag of a country name, or you can specify a specific city in that country. It’s up to you.

The way I tag my photos is as follows:

1. First I organize my photos in a standard directory structure I choose. For example, for a picture I take in 2007 at a family BBQ, the structure will look like: 2007\Family BBQ

All pictures that are taken in 2007 will be located in that directory. Each year will have its own directory, with specific events in each of those directories.

2. Now that the photos are in the directories, I can now organize them in the software. I click on one of the directories and begin by tagging the place, followed by the event and then the people.

Note: Many photo organizers use the name categories instead of tags. In the following steps I will use the name categories, mostly because it is easier to understand. Also, I include square brackets in the names. They are just to distinguish the name of the categories, so you don’t need to include them.

• For places I always create the following categories and sub-categories: [Country] – [Province\State] – [City]. If there is not province or state, I leave that tag out.
• For events I usually just give it a name. If the event occurs annually, I will usually create a sub-category that includes the year. For example, [Family BBQ] – [2007].
• For people, I will label the category in the format: [Last Name], [First Name]. This helps keep those who are related next to each other in the list.




3. If there are specific photos I want printed from many different categories, I will usually create a temporary category called [Print] and assign those photos to that category as well. This way I will know exactly which photos I need to print.

Many people also rename the photos to help identify or organize them. I can’t be bothered to go through thousands of photos and rename them. I have organizing software that can do that quicker and easier than renaming.

Summary

Organizing thousands of digital photos can be difficult and time consuming. If you invest in a good digital photo organizer you will be able to organize your photo collection quickly and easily. Once you tag all of your photos, you will be able to find a specific photo in a matter of seconds instead of hours.

Related Posts

Digital Photo Workflow
Organizing Digital Archives
Tips on Taking Photographs with a Digital Camera
Converting Digital Photos for E-mail or Web

Related Posts

1. How I Organize My Digital Photos
2. Converting Digital Photos for E-mail or the Web
3. Digital Photos: Should You Use Raw or JPEG?

Picture Size

Digital cameras usually allow you to adjust the size of a picture. The size of the pictures is usually specified in pixels and usually in the format length x width. For example, a 6 megapixel picture will be indicated as 3000×2000.

There are many reasons you may want to select a smaller picture size. One reason is to fit more pictures on you memory card. The smaller the picture, the less storage space it needs. The second reason is to target a specific output device. You may want to take smaller pictures if the pictures will only be sent via e-mail or displayed on the Web.

I recommend that you always take pictures at the highest possible setting. The price of flash memory cards is ever decreasing so you can always buy more memory. If you do need to shrink the picture to send in an e-mail, then you can always do that in a photo editor.

Picture Compression Quality

Most digital cameras save the pictures in a JPEG format, which uses lossless compression. This reduces the size of the picture. The more compression you use, the smaller the picture.

Increasing the compression also has a downside. The picture quality deteriorates as the compression increases. Square blotches of pixels, known as JPEG artifacts, begin appearing with an increase in compression.

The compression setting is indicated differently between cameras. Some digital cameras use stars (more stars means less compression), while others use acronyms, such as SHQ for super high quality. Read your digital camera manual to determine how the compression quality is indicated on your camera.

I recommend to always using the least amount of compression when taking pictures. As with resizing a picture, you can always apply more compression with a photo editor. Use the best quality picture also provides better enlarged prints, as the JPEG compression is not noticeable.

It should be noted that if your camera can save pictures in a RAW format, the compression quality doesn’t affect that format. For more information regarding JPEG and RAW, please read JPEG or RAW Format.

White Balance

For most people who use a digital camera, the Auto setting is what they set their camera to. This is fine, but sometimes may not produce the desired colours in the picture. For more accurate colour, you may want to learn about white balancing.

Digital cameras have the ability to adjust their white balance to a specific light source. This simply offsets the colour of the light source to keep the colours as true to life as possible.

Digital cameras usually have a standard set of white balance options such as daylight, cloudy, tungsten and flash. More advanced digital cameras include other settings such as shade, fluorescent, and custom.

Although you can take great pictures on the automatic setting, you may want to learn about white balancing to get even more true to life colours. Just remember to modify the settings once your lighting changes.

For more information about white balance, please see Understanding White Balance.

Movie Mode

Depending on your digital camera, it may also have a movie feature. This can be handy if you don’t have a digital video camera with you. The videos that are captured by a digital camera are much lower quality than a digital video camera.

You may be limited to the amount of video you can take, whether it is in time or file size. Still it can come in handy for those once-in-a-lifetime shots.

I have used the video feature a few times on my digital camera, but rarely use it as it takes up a lot more memory than several pictures.

Summary

I discussed some of the most popular features of a digital camera in this post, as well as provided my recommendation on how to use each feature. The recommendations, however, were my own opinion, so you should try out each feature is decide how you want to use them yourself.

Related Posts

1. Understanding White Balance
2. Unlock Features of Your Canon Digital Camera
3. Tips on Taking Photographs with a Digital Camera

There are many types of memory cards on the market today, and different digital cameras require different memory cards. Some cameras even allow you to use two types of memory cards. What is the difference between all the types, and which one is better? This post will describe the various popular memory types and discuss their differences.

What is Flash Memory?

Before we look at the various cards, it is important to understand what I mean I say flash memory. You may be familiar with computer memory (RAM) or hard drive space, which have been around for many years. Both of these storage mediums have their advantages and disadvantages. The RAM in your computer has no moving parts so it may not break as easily than a hard drive, but it is volatile, meaning that it won’t keep the data once the power is turned off. Hard drives are non-volatile, can hold enormous amounts of data, but they have many moving parts, that could easily break.

Flash memory is non-volatile memory with no moving parts. They have been known to be durable even on some intense testing. The memory can be electrically erased and written to just like a hard drive, and very small physically. Although they don’t have the storage capacity of a hard drive, they are becoming larger each year.

CompactFlash / MicroDrive

The CompactFlash cards were once the most common flash cards used, however, that crown now belongs to the Secure Digital memory. CompactFlash is rather large at 3.3mm x 36.4mm x 42.8mm (thickness x length x width) for the Type I compared to the other memory cards. Type II cards are thicker at 5.0mm, but the length and width sizes are the same. Cameras that use Type I cannot use Type II, however, cameras that use Type II can use either.

Some older cameras that use CompactFlash may not be able to use any size larger than 2GB. This is because CompactFlash uses FAT for sizes under 2GB, and FAT32 for any sizes above 2GB.

Some cameras that accept CompactFlash Type II may also be able to use a MicroDrive. A MicroDrive is a small hard drive usually in sizes of 340MB and 1GB.

Secure Digital (SD) / MultiMediaCard (MMC)

This is perhaps the most common memory card in use today. They are much smaller (2.1mm x 32mm x 24mm) than the CompactFlash cards but have the same amount of storage space.

Both the SD and MMC cards are almost identical in terms of size and look on the outside, but inside they are technically different. Although your digital camera may accept SD memory cards, it may not accept MMC cards as well.

There are also miniSD cards on the market mostly used in MP3 players and mobile phones; I have yet to see any digital cameras that use this memory card. The miniSD is smaller than the SD card since it is only 1.4mm x 21.5mm x 20mm.

Sony Memory Stick (MS)

This type of memory card, or rather stick, was created by Sony in 1999 and is used in all of their Cybershot digital cameras as well as their digital video Handycams.

The original blue Memory Stick was incredibly slow compared to today’s SD and CompactFlash cards. There have been several versions, or types of memory sticks developed by Sony over the years.

There is the Memory Stick Select which allows you to select between 128MB and 256MB to make it compatible with older digital cameras. Next came the Memory Stick Pro that had a capacity up to 2GB. With the exception of the Cybershot F717, this Memory Stick was not compatible with any of the pre-2003 digital cameras. There is also a high speed Memory Stick Pro that is capable of transfer speeds of 80Mbps.

xD-Picture Card (xD)

The xD card was developed by Olympus and Fujifilm and is about the size of a postage stamp. Most Olympus digital cameras now use the xD card. There are currently two types of xD cards on the market: the M series and the H series.

Not all cameras can accept both types of xD memory cards, so check your manual before purchasing an xD card. The H series cards are reported to be about 2-3 times faster than the M series.

Summary

There are many types of flash memory cards on the market to use with your digital camera. Any digital camera you purchase today will use one of the memory cards mentioned in this post. Always read your instruction manual that came with your camera to determine the exact memory card that you can use. As always, technology progresses, and there may be a time when the above memory cards will be replaced with something else. As long as you can keep taking pictures, you don’t need to worry about that, though.

Related Posts

1. About Digital Cameras
2. Understanding Digital Camera Features
3. How Digital Cameras Work

Nickel-Metal Hydride (NiMH)

Although research into the NiMH system began in the 1970s, these batteries first began being used commercially around 1990 and are currently used in digital cameras in AA form. In the early days of NiMH batteries, the metal hydride alloys were unstable so the desired performance characteristics were not achieved.

In the 1980s, new metal hydride alloys were developed that were stable enough for use in a cell. By the late 1980s, the energy density of the NiMH batteries had gradually improved.

The metals used in NiMH batteries are environmentally friendly and have a high energy density, which have contributed to its success.

The fast charge time of a battery is 2 to 4 hours. The charge-discharge cycle life of a NiMH battery is roughly 300-500 cycles at up to 80% of the initial capacity. If not used, a NiMH battery will lose 30% of its charge every 30 days.

Lithium Ion (Li-ion)

Early work with creating the lithium battery began in 1912 by G.N. Lewis. The first non-rechargeable lithium batteries became available in the early 1970s. The instability of the lithium metal during charging caused safety concerns during attempts to make a rechargeable lithium batter in the 1980s.

Lithium metal is a light-weight metal and has the greatest electrochemical potential and also provides the largest energy density per weight. Since lithium is unstable during charging, non-metallic lithium has since been research. Although lower in energy density than lithium metal, lithium ion is safe, provided that certain precautions are following during charging and discharging.

The first Li-ion battery was first commercialized by Sony in 1991.

It will take 2 to 4 hours to fully charge a Li-ion battery. The number of charge-discharge cycles for a Li-ion batter is 500 to 1000. The Li-ion battery will lose about 10% of its charge every 30 days.

The charge of a Li-ion battery will decrease over time because of oxidation. This occurs naturally and cannot be restored with cycling or any external method. The loss of charge capacity is permanent because the metal used in the cells is only designated to last for a certain period of time.

Which Battery Should I Use?

Many digital cameras include a large battery that can be charged within the camera itself. These batteries are usually the Li-ion type of rechargeable battery. They will usually last quite a long time when not in use, so you won’t need to recharge as frequently. The Li-ion batteries are usually more expensive to purchase, and your digital camera may only accept a specific model.

If your camera only accepts AA batteries, then you should choose the NiMH rechargeable batteries. These batteries may come with their own charge since you won’t be able to charge them right in the camera. Always buy two sets of batteries, so when one set has discharged, you can use your spare while recharging the first set.

Look at the milliamp hours (mAH) value when purchasing rechargeable batteries. This value is a measure of the battery’s total charge capacity. The higher the number means the larger the capacity.

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Digital cameras have the ability to change what is known as the "White Balance&quot (WB). This setting attempts to offset the colour produced by a specific light source to make the colours as true as possible. This post will discuss what white balance is, and how to use it.

Auto White Balance (AWB)

When a digital camera is set to auto one of the settings that is automatically adjusted when a picture is taken is the white balance. In many situations, this setting can produce good results, but in others it may not.

Auto white balance can produce great sunny, cloudy and fine indoor shots under normal circumstances. Under abnormal circumstances, such as a winter scene with a lot of snow or a white sandy beach, the pictures may not produce the best photos. The best way to use auto white balance is to take a picture and then look at the result. If the result is good, then continue to use auto white balance. If the result is not good, then you may need to use some of the camera’s preset white balances.

Preset White Balance

Many digital cameras include a few preset white balance settings. The number and type of presets varies from camera to camera. The preset settings can be used in specific lighting conditions, such as sunny, cloudy and tungsten.

Unlike auto, however, you will need to remember to change your colour settings when the lighting changes. Using a tungsten setting on a cloudy day will produce a strong, undesirable colour cast in your photos.

Using a preset value can improve the colour quality of a photo easily, although it may not work as well in a setting that has multiple different light sources. For lighting more complex you may want to take white balancing one step further by specifying a custom white balance.

Custom White Balance

This setting is not available on all digital cameras, but if your camera has it then you can be more precise with your white balance. There may be times where auto white balance or one of the preset settings doesn’t work for you. In a case such as that, you can use your custom white balance. This setting requires you to use an object that has a completely neutral colour (white, gray or black), and that object is illuminated by the light sources in your picture.

You simply fill your frame with the object and set the white balance. The camera will try to make the object a neutral colour, causing any colour casts to also be eliminated. The most common object used to set a custom white balance is a gray card, which can be purchased at any local photography store. Another object is a blank sheet of white paper, which can be easily folded up and carried with you.

I talk in more detail about using a gray card in my post: Using a Gray Card

RAW Format

The RAW format isn’t a white balance setting, but it is important to mention. The RAW format is a type of picture file saved by your camera. Most of the higher-end cameras include this as an option instead of saving as a JPEG file. Others allow you to save both.

The reason mentioning the RAW format is important is because when an image is saved in this format no white balance setting is applied to the picture. Setting the white balance of a RAW picture can be done after the file has been downloaded to you computer. This allows even more find control over the colour correction of your picture. The downside to this is that you can print directly from your memory card, but must first download the file, edit it and then save it in another format.

My post titled JPEG or RAW Format goes into more detail about the differences between the two picture formats.

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The Image Sensor

Digital cameras include a digital sensor that converts light into electrical charges. There are two types of image sensors found in digital cameras: charged coupled device (CCD) and complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS). Most digital cameras use a CCD image sensor so we’ll focus on that type.

The CCD has millions of elements that are light-sensitive. Each one of these elements represents a single point in the picture, which is called a pixel in computer terms. For example, a 6 megapixel camera would have approximately 6 million pixels. A megapixel is equivalent to 1 million pixels.

When light hits one of these elements an electric charge is created with the strength of the charge determining the brightness of the pixel. No charge produces black while a full charge produces white. As you can see, a CCD produces shades of gray and not colour. Colour is produced using a filter within the digital camera.

Generating Colour

There are many kinds of filters that can be used within a digital camera to generate colour, but the most common one is the Bayer filter pattern. This type of filter contains a series of rows with one row alternating between red and green, while the next alternates between blue and green. You’ll notice that green is in all rows, why is that?

The human eye is more sensitive to green colours than to red or blue. To ensure that the images appear as "true colour", there are more green pixels than red or blue. In other words, there is the same amount of green as there are blue and red combined. The image below shows an example of a bayer filter.

When a picture is taken, the raw output from a bayer filter is a mosaic of red, green and blue pixels. The digital camera then uses a demosaicing algorithm to convert this image into true colours. Each pixel in the filter can be used more than once, and the colour of each pixel is determined by averaging the values from the surrounding pixels.

Once the image is generated from the CCD and coloured by the filter, the camera than applies any white balancing, sharpening, contrast, and other settings specified by the photographer. This step is skipped if the picture is to be saved in a RAW format.

Storing the Image

Early digital cameras stored the images on memory within the camera. As digital cameras evolved, new types of removable memory became available. Digital cameras today can use one or several types of memory including:

• CompactFlash
• Secure Digital (SD)
• Memory Stick
• SmartMedia
• CDs or DVDs

Some cameras can also accept two types of memory, such as CompactFlash and SD, although most only accept one type. No matter what type of memory your camera uses, you will need a lot of room to store the pictures, especially when storing the images in one of the uncompressed formats.

The most common file format used by digital cameras is JPEG. This is a compressed format commonly used for photographs. JPEG files use a lossy compression, meaning that data in the picture is discarded when the file is compressed. The more a file is compressed, the more data is lost and JPEG artifacts appear. This also means that the file size is smaller. Your digital camera has built-in settings that can be used to control the amount of compression.

Another common format used by digital cameras is the TIFF format. This is usually an uncompressed format which results in much larger file sizes. Unlike JPEG, however, a picture in TIFF format doesn’t lose any data. You trade memory space for quality.

Some of the higher-end cameras can also save pictures in a format called RAW. In this format, no processing (white balance, sharpening, and contrast) is done by the camera. This format allows complete control for those that like editing images in photo editing software. These files are larger than JPEG but are much higher quality. One of the biggest differences between RAW and the other formats is that RAW is proprietary. This means that only specific photo editors can be used to modify a RAW file.

Once a picture has been saved to the memory card, the next step is transferring the pictures to a computer.

Transferring Pictures

Digital cameras can store hundreds and possibly thousands of images on a memory card. That’s great, but you would probably also like to delete the old images to make room for the new ones. This is done by transferring the images to a computer.

Included with your camera is either a USB (Universal Serial Bus) or Firewire cable. These cables are used to transfer data between devices. Your computer will have either a USB or Firewire port, or both. Simply plug in the cable into your computer and then into your digital camera. Turn on you camera and your computer will recognize the camera and allow you to transfer the files.

I use Windows XP, and when I plug in my camera it instantly becomes a drive letter under Windows Explorer. This allows me to copy the images to my computer just as I would with any file.

An alternative to using your camera to transfer pictures is to purchase a card reader. Card readers require little power (they get their power from the USB or Firewire port), and they may transfer the files faster than your camera. Without using your camera, you can also save battery power. The one big difference between the card read and the camera is that a card reader may support many different types of memory cards. This allows someone with a CompactFlash card and someone else with a SD card to use the same card reader.

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Optical Media (CD/DVD)

CD/DVDs are perhaps the most popular method for backing up digital photos, as most computers now come with a burner and software. Most photo organizing software also include the ability to burn your photos to a CD/DVD.

Advantages: Very little cost to storing your digital photos, as your computer probably includes a burner. You can buy CD/DVD spindles that include hundreds of blank discs for a few dollars. A single layer, single-sided DVD can hold up to 4.7GB, which means you can store thousands of photos on a single DVD.

Disadvantages: The biggest and possibly most talked about problem with optical media is that they could develop problems as time passes. This could lead to you digital photos becoming unreadable. To help minimize read problems in the future, only buy name brand CD/DVDs.

Another disadvantage with CD/DVDs is the fact that they are a progressing technology. This means that in a few years they will be replaced by another form of optical media. For example, the CD is now being replaced buy the DVD, which in turn is slowly being replaced by high-definition DVDs. This means that you will have to eventually move your backups to the next generation of optical media every few years.

Hard Drives

Hard drives can store enormous amounts of information, much more than either tapes or CD/DVDs. All computers come with at least one built-in hard drive so you don’t need to buy anything else. An external hard drive, however, is preferred for backing up data.

Advantages: As mentioned they have massive amount of storage capacity, meaning one hard drive can probably store your entire digital photo collection. You would only have to purchase the drive and no additional media. An external hard drive is very common today, and can connect to your computer through the USB port. This keeps your data safe in case your computer fails and you need to reinstall your operating system. Unlike the other media, hard drives have been around for many years, and although the technology may change, you will still be able to use your current hard drive for many years.

Disadvantages: The biggest problem that you can run into would be a hard drive failure. Always keep in mind that anything with moving parts can break, and a hard drive is no exception. If you take care of your hard drive, then it should last for many years.

Magnetic Media (Tape)

This is not as popular for a home user as it is for a business user. Tapes are popular for a business since they can store much more than a CD or DVD, and they are more reliable.

Advantages: Tapes, as mentioned, can store a large amount of data, although not as much as a hard drive. Not only can they store a lot of data, but they can also be erased and rewritten many times. If you take care of your tape, then it can last for many years.

Disadvantages: Out of the media mentioned in this post, tape backup is probably the most expensive. You would need to buy a tape drive, and then the individual tapes, and depending on the type you buy it can be quite expensive. This is one of the reasons tapes or used more in business than at home. Tapes can also degrade if used on a frequent basis, which could cause problems with your data, so just like the other media you will need to take care of your tapes.

Online

This type of backup isn’t discussed as frequently because most don’t think about using an online service to store their data. There are many places online that can provide you with enough disk space for your entire digital photo collection, but you will need to research the best Web site that suits your needs.

Advantages: One of the biggest advantages is that you don’t need to worry about resaving your data as technology progresses. Your chosen online company will do that for you. Another advantage is that the online company probably has a good backup and restore system in place in case of a hardware problem (at least you hope). This will help ensure that you never lose your data.

Disadvantages: You will probably need to pay a monthly fee to store your data on the servers, and depending on your budget, this may not work for you. You will also need to do much research into the online company first to ensure that your data is safe and secure. The last thing you need is to see your digital photos all over the Internet because someone accessed your backups.

My Method for Backing Up

After reading this post, you may be wondering how I choose to back up my digital photos. Here is what I do:

1. First I copy the digital photos to an external hard drive. I use a Western Digital 250GB hard drive which has more than enough storage space for my needs. This also allows me to pull up the pictures at anytime without having to find a DVD first.
2. I then backup the same photos to a DVD (usually one for each year). This allows me to keep my digital photos off site in case something happens.
3. I also maintain my collection of digital photos on an online Web site. This provides extra protection for my photos.

As you can see I don’t stick with one method of backing up my digital photos. The best thing you can do when backing up your photos is to make multiple copies. This way if one copy doesn’t work, you have another.

Summary

I discussed the various media that you can use to back up your digital photos. I have also described the method I use to backup my photos. After reading this post, I hope that you will be able to choose your preferred method to keep your photos safe for many years. Remember: always make multiple copies of your data.

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In this post I will outline the steps I use to resize my digital photos so they can be easily sent by e-mail or posted to a Web site. The steps outlined are general enough where they can be used by most photo editors as they all have the needed features.

Converting Digital Photos

1. First thing to do before starting is to move the digital photos to a folder on your computer, if you haven’t already done so.
2. Next I create another folder called E-mail which will eventually contain all the photos that I will send. Moving the photos to this folder will help prevent overwriting the originals.

Note: I always make a backup of my original photos to both a CD and external hard drive. I treat my original photos as my negatives in case I need to make another print.

3. Open up your photo editor. The editor you use is up to you. I personally use Photoshop, but this application is for advanced users.
4. Load your photo into your photo editor.
5. If you need to perform any colour, contrast, and brightness adjustments, now is the time to do that. Don’t, however, preform any sharpening at this stage as resizing the photo will affect the sharpness.
6. Once all the necessary adjustments have been performed, we will now resize the image. Click the resize option in your editor. Depending on your editor, you may see the photo size in inches, pixels or both. For displaying photos on a computer monitor, we will use pixels, so make sure you can specify the size in pixels.
7. When I resize an image I usually take the larger length and set it to 500 pixels. For example, if an image is 3000×2000, I would change the 3000 to 500, which should automatically change the 2000 to 400 pixels.

Note: The 500 pixels value is a personal preference. I find that it is large enough to view, and small enough to send in an e-mail. You can choose whatever size you like.

8. Once the photo has been resized you can now go about sharpening the photo, as making it smaller may have reduced its sharpness.
9. After your photo has been sharpened, it is now time to save it to the E-mail folder. Your photo editor should come with a Save As… option located in the File menu, which you should click now.
10. For photos, ensure that the file type is set to JPEG. You will now need to specify a compression amount. For images this small, I can usually get by with about 40-50% compression. This is one of those trial and error ideas. Try various compression settings to see which one provides the smallest file size without creating too many artifacts in the image.
11. Specify the E-mail directory as the location of your file, and then save the file.

The photo is now ready to be sent in an e-mail or uploaded to a Web site. Those receiving the file will be happy that they don’t have to wait as long to download the file.

If your photo editor, such as Photoshop, has the ability to automate tasks, you may want to use that feature. This will allow you to resize and save many photos at one time with the click of a button.

Summary

This post outlined the steps I take to prepare a digital photo for sending via an e-mail or uploading to a Web site. Since many digital photos can be quite large (2MB+), it is important to resize the photos before sending them.

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For most people, the JPEG format is the one they will use. I enjoyed use the RAW format since I’m not a great photographer so I like the ability to change my settings after the fact. For more information on the two formats, please read my JPEG or RAW Format post. With the JPEG, I now need to get my settings correct within the camera, and this includes the colour settings.

To ensure that I get the colours in my pictures as close to accurate as I can, I use a gray card. Using a gray card is really simple to use, and can be used with any digital camera that allows for a custom white balance to be set. Gray cards can be purchased at any camera store. I use WhiBal since it is smaller, durable, and contains both a white and black patch as well.

Setting White Balance for JPEG

My workflow for use a gray card is as follows:

1. I place my gray card in a place that is lit by same light as my picture. If I’m outdoors on a sunny day I place my card in the sun. When indoors with a light source, I place it under the light. Doing this will make sure the light provides a colour cast to the gray card.
2. Next, I set my camera to custom white balance. The manual that came with your camera will explain how to do this.
3. I then fill my viewfinder, or LCD screen, with the gray card so it is all that I can see.
4. I press the button on my camera to set the white balance off the gray card.

As long as the lighting doesn’t change, I can now use the same white balance settings for all my pictures. If the lighting does change, then I just repeat the above steps to set a new white balance.

Setting White Balance for RAW

Setting the white balance for a RAW format picture is much easier, when taking a picture, than a JPEG. You can follow the same steps as a JPEG, but with a RAW file you can set the white balance after the picture is taken. The following steps outline the workflow for a RAW file:

1. I place my gray card in a place that is lit by same light as my picture. If I’m outdoors on a sunny day I place my card in the sun. When indoors with a light source, I place it under the light. Doing this will make sure the light provides a colour cast to the gray card.
2. Instead of setting the white balance manually, I set the camera to "Auto" or "Program".
3. I then take a picture of the gray card (it doesn’t have to fill the viewfinder, just as long as it is in the picture).
4. I keep the same settings, and take my pictures.

Just as with a JPEG you will need to repeat the above RAW format steps when the lighting changes.

As mentioned earlier, the white balance for RAW pictures can be set after the fact in a photo editor. The following steps outline how to correct the white balance:

1. Once all the pictures (including those with the gray card) have been downloaded to your computer, open the gray card picture in a photo editor.
2. The editor will usually provide a means to set the gray level in the picture. For example, in Photoshop it looks like a gray eyedropper. Select that, and then click the gray card in the picture.
3. Save the colour settings to your computer.
4. Apply the saved colour settings to all pictures that were taken in the same lighting conditions.
5. Repeat for all gray card pictures that were taken.

Summary

This post provided a quick overview of how to use a gray card when saving a picture in either JPEG or RAW format.

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