Taking good pictures

[mjb123]

Hi I'm a complete novice I had a canon 450d bought for me 3 years ago before my child was born, I have taken some great pictures with it but mainly just point and shoot, I have a tamron 18-270 which is great, I'm starting to get my head around exposures and shutter speeds and all the other million and 1 things you have to take into consideration.
The only thing I have to refer to is Dslr tool kit for dummies which has in it tables with different conditions and scenarios and tells you the shutter speed ,exposure and aperture you should use trouble is I don't think it's very accurate, for example in bright sunshine taking pictures of flowers it says iso 50 which my camera won't go to so I used 100 f4 and 1/250s the picture I took was of bright yellow flowers up close which came out all dark round the edges.
Is this my bad photography skills or are these the wrong settings, is there a good up to date book that would explain settings and how there used, I no a lot of it is probably just a case of experimenting and learning by your mistakes!
+ I don't no a lot about macro photography this lens is i believe a macro lens would it be capable of taking some good close up pictures or would I need some kind of add on!!
Anyway lots of stuff said any answers to any of this would be great!!

Just realised I've posted this on wrong section so I've put in basics feel free to ignore this!!

 

[Russ77]

I think the tables you are referring to should be regarded as "guides"

What they don't take into position is the angle that the light is hitting the subject.

A far better way of getting the exposure right is to set up the camera so it highlights over exposure when you review the image on the viewfinder (popularly known on here as "blinkies" as the areas that are too bright blink).

I would approach any given situation by setting the camera up based on what the exposure guide is telling me and in most scenarios setting shutter, aperture and ISO so it's 0.

Then take the shot and review........ Does the image look too dark? OK, this can be hard to tell on a small LCD screen but it should give you an idea, if it is take the shot again but tweek the settings slightly to allow more light in.

If any of the areas are blown and "blinking" at you decide if they are important to the shot (i.e. if the subject is exposed reasonably well but parts of the background/sky are blinking, you're probably OK).

I'm only touching the tip of the iceberg here but like I say, the tables are a guide, not law

Marco lens wise...... you're lens will be capable of close up photography but it's not a "macro" lens. There are options with regards to macro photography as you can buy dedicated macro lenses or conversion "tubes" and filters for non-macro lenses.

A popular choice for people new to macro is a canon 50mm 1.8f and some extention tubes.

Hope this helps a bit

 

[odd jim]

As above, take "tables" with a pinch of salt.

No two shooting scenarios are the same and all will require different settings so basically use the tools the camera gives you (lightmeter, histograms etc) and take your time, with practice you'll nail it without having to resort to trial an error!

 

[Photodiva]

In the playback mode of your camera you can view the exif info which records the s/s, aperture, iso etc. This might be helpful to learning about which settings you used for particular shots.

A rule of thumb is sunny 16 and 1 over the iso, which basically means on a sunny day landscape, try manully setting f/16 and iso 100, s/s of 1/125 (the nearest to 100) as a starting point.

If that's over exposed, try a higher s/s, if its too dark, perhaps a wider aperture. Take some time to experiment, try the same shot with different settings (ideal in the garden or in the park). View the histogram in the camera playback.

 

[TheBigYin]

If "tables" were accurate enough to work from, nobody would have ever bothered to invent lightmeters, or to install metering systems into cameras. By all means use them as a way of getting a rough "ballpark" setting on the camera before you start taking anything, but use the facilites in the camera - it's not as if you're shooting on film - take a picture, see if it's over/under exposed - then zone into the correct setting. Use the histograms and blinkies as mentioned above - eventually you get a feel for a situation, but it all comes with practice.

And always remember, what you see people on here showing, is the best shots they got, nobody sees the bad shots - and yours are the same - every duff shot is a learning opportunity, learn from it, and move on to a better shot - it wouldn't be much of a hobby if you nailed the best shot in any genre at the first attempt, would it...

 

[TCR4x4]

..what you see people on here showing, is the best shots they got, nobody sees the bad shots

Speak for yourself, you've obviously never seen my picture posts