Lessons

Lesson Info

Camera Operation

For this last section, Camera Operation, it's gonna be kind of the conclusion of everything we've been learning about in this class. And we've learned about all the details. What do we need to be thinking about in the big scope of things? When you go out and shoot, you wanna make sure you have a charged battery. You should probably have two or three batteries with you just because these batteries don't have the longest lifespan. Have a card in the camera. You probably wanna reformat that on a regular basis. Check your image quality. Make sure it's set the way that you want to. I like having it in RAW plus JPEG. See if there's any sort of funky settings that you've been making on the menu settings. Make sure that they're right, and if you're gonna be taking a big trip or shooting and important assignment, make sure that your sensor is clean. You don't wanna have to deal with too many dust specks in a lot of important photos. Now one thing you've probably picked up is there's a lot of cu...

stomizing of the Fuji camera. And so here's just a little kind of breakdown on how to think about this. On the camera there is a lot of hard controls that you don't have any chance of changing other than it's there on the camera and you just adjust what they have. Like the Shutter Speed and ISO dial. There's no real customizing of these dials. They're just there. Next up are the ones that you get to control. All of these different buttons on the camera can be customized the way that you want them to work. Whatever is most important is what you want to be able to have accessible on these types of buttons. Next up, you have the Quick Menu. And this is very easily accessed. It's got 16 different options in there. And whatever the 16 most options that are not already used in the custom controls on the camera is what you should have here. For the look and style of your images, you do have the Custom Settings. And so whether you like to shoot color or black and white at different contrast levels, you can set that in to those custom settings. And then we have My Menu, which you can actually have two pages of this or 16 items in here. Various items throughout the menu system that you would like to organize into smaller collections so that they're easier to find. And then for those last items, you may need to dive into the Menu system. But if you have done a good job setting your camera up, you will rarely need to go into the Menu system at all. Which can be very handy 'cause as we've seen, it's rather large and can get a bit clumsy in getting lost in there if you don't know where you're going. Use all those other options for shortcuts and Quick Menus and My Menu so that you don't have to go into the Menu at all. Alright, here is your shortcut review. The Hammer has a lot of sneaky shortcuts by secret button presses. And here is kind of my quick review of all of the ones that I could find on the camera. First up, for checking the firmware of your body or lens, press in the display button and turn the camera on. If you wanna format the memory card, you press the garbage can for two seconds and then press in on the rear command dial. If you wanna switch which card you are looking at press the playback for two seconds or you can press the focus stick when you are in the playback mode. Either one of those will give you the shortcut into that. So more shortcuts. For changing the focus size of box that you are using press in on the joystick and turn the command dial. To reprogram the focus stick, you can press in and hold it for two seconds. And you'll have the option of locking it or having the push to lock or just leaving it on all the time. You can which way the camera is giving you manual focus assist by pressing in on the rear dial for two seconds. And the options are a standard magnification, the split image, and the focus peaking. Alright, so more for you. You wanna reprogram the function buttons on the camera, which are all the buttons scattered throughout the camera. Hold in on the display back button for two seconds and that will give you a shortcut to that menu item. The command dial in the front, you can press that in for two seconds, and that will give you the option of changing shudder speeds. Zoom in on a focus area. You can adjust that on the back of the camera on the playback. Press in on that and so that will zoom you in when you're in the playback mode. You can customize the Quick Menu by holding in the Q button for two seconds. So a lot of them, these are buttons that you're holding in for two seconds to get into customizing it. Remember for Playback Menu, you just hit Playback and then the Menu button. And if you wanna activate the Playback Menu, you can also just simply press in on the focusing stick when you're in the playback mode and in one way or the other. And so there's a couple of different ways of accessing that Playback Menu. Alright, so total controls on the camera. The important ones are ones controlling the exposure, shutter speed, aperture, ISO, and exposure compensation. Focus Mode is, of course, very important. Easy dial to work with on the front of the camera. Drive settings are pretty obvious and easy. And then the White Balance is a shortcut button on the back of the camera. But you might be able to reprogram that if you wanted. And the AF Mode is also important. Which mode you're using, as far as which area, a single, larger box, or the entire area. So lay those out and all their options. Here's what they kinda look like. And let's set our cameras up for different types of scenarios. First up, let's just do a super simple setup for basic photography, and this is where we're gonna leave the camera in a lot of automated modes. Turn the Shutter Speed dial to A. Set the aperture on the lens to Automatic. Turn the ISO dial to Auto and the Exposures will be completely taken care of. It will be looking at what Shutter Speeds you're getting and try to keep you into a reasonable handheld shutter speed. I would probably keep the Exposure Compensation at zero unless you know you need to change it. White Balance can stay at Auto unless it needs to be changed. Focus Mode in the front of the camera would be in Single for stationary subjects. The AF Mode Wide and Tracking will simply look over the entire area and choose whatever is closest to the camera. It doesn't always work, but it works in most situations pretty well. And the Drive Mode, I would just leave it in Single so that you're shooting one shot at a time. Alright, let's look at some more specific examples. First up is Landscape Photography. Here we typically want more depth of field, which means we're gonna have to stop the Aperture down. And we're gonna probably end up with a slower Shutter Speed which is why a lot of landscape photographers use tripods. Alright in this case, first thing I would set is an ISO of 200 because that's gonna get me the best image quality on the sensor. Next up is I want lots of depth of field, F8 or F11 or 16 might be good options. It depends on your composition. Shutter Speed is not nearly as important here because you're not likely to have a lot of moving subjects. You often end up with a slower Shutter Speed when you're stopping your Aperture down, which is why it's nice to be on a tripod if you're at a slow Shutter Speed like a 30th of a second. But the Shutter Speed will depend on the amount of light that you have at that time. Don't worry about Exposure Compensation when you are manually setting all those previous features. Auto White Balance unless it's not giving you the right color. Focus Mode Single 'cause it's a stationary subject. Single focusing area so that you can be very precise about where the focus point is put to. And the Drive Mode can be at Single in this case. You may want to use a cable release or you may want to also activate the two second self timer in this landscape mode. Next up, let's talk about portrait photography. Here we're gonna want it to have shallow depth of field. So our subject's in focus and our background is nice and blurry. Probably need a little bit faster Shutter Speed to accommodate for our handhelding of the lens and camera, as well as the subject that might be moving around a bit. In this case, you might want a very shallow depth of field. You're shooting portraits having a 1.4 Aperture is a nice thing to shoot with. You'll need a Shutter Speed probably of 125th or faster depending on how fast you or subjects might be moving. Ideally you would have an ISO of because that's the best quality setting. You may need to bump it up if the light levels are not very high. Don't need Exposure Compensation. Auto White Balance should be fine in most situations as long as your subjects are not moving. Single Focus is good. For AF Mode, you could choose the Single mode and get it on their face or on their eye. You could also use one of the face or eye detection focusing options. And for the Drive Mode, single is probably fine. Or you might want the Continuous if you know you wanna shoot lots of pictures in there. Next up, let's do some Action Photography. So when you have subjects moving around you're gonna need faster Shutter Speeds to stop their action and you're gonna need to track their movement with a focusing system that can do that. So in this case, the first thing I would think about is choosing a Shutter Speed of 500th of a second or faster depending on how fast the movement is. This is where those fast 2.8 lenses really pay off. Because you're gonna need a faster Shutter Speed. You're gonna need to let in more light with the Aperture. You're probably also gonna need a higher ISO as well. Most sports and action photography will be at 400 or higher. We'll leave Auto White Balance in as long as it's working. Focus Mode very important change here going to Continuous so that it can track subjects moving forward and back from you. The Single Point is a little hard to keep on a subject that's moving around a lot. And so this is where you might wanna use that zone box of three, five, or seven frames or focus points in there. And so it gives you an easier target to put on your subject to track them. For the Drive Mode, Continuous Medium or Continuous High, depends on how fast you wanna capture that action. And then you may want to put the camera in the Boost Mode if it's not already there. Because if you recall, it is acquiring and working with the focus system a little bit faster, as well as giving you a little faster readout in the viewfinder so that you can follow that action a little bit better. So that would be a good option if you're doing a lot of action photography. Next up is Basic Photography. And this is where you might not know what you're next photo's gonna be and you just wanna be ready for something that might come along. In this case, I like to use a little bit of automation when it comes to the Shutter Speed. I'll let the camera figure out the Shutter Speed. I will chose and Aperture, a modest Aperture like 5.6 is kinda middle of the road. If I need to open up or close down, it's pretty easy to do. And my shutter speeds will be adjusted as necessary from there. I like to leave the ISO as low as it can be because that's the best image quality. If I need faster Shutter Speeds I'll bump up that ISO as necessary. Usually I'll leave the Exposure Compensation at zero unless I know I'm trying to do something specific and change it for a particular feature. White Balance once again will be at Auto unless I need to change it. Focus Mode is on Single because that's most subjects that you're shooting are not moving around too much. But it depends on exactly what you shoot. Focus Mode of Single allows me to be very precise as to where the focus point is gonna go. I'll use that focus stick to move it left, right, up, and down to get exactly what I want in focus. And the Drive Mode in Single should work fine if you need to take multiple photos, you can always lift your finger up and down quickly to take those single photos. Alright folks, you've made it to the end. And so I can now deem that you are and expert in the Fuji X-H1 'cause we have been through all of the various different features. If you are interested in following me or keeping up with the various things that I have going these days, you can check me out at my website johngringo.com. I'm also on Facebook and Instagram. And feel free to connect up with me there. I do answer questions and help people out. So if you wanna check that out, by all means. Go to the sites and follow me.