DSLR Shooting Lessons

So I just found out today that my approach to filming with my Sony a33 has not been exactly intelligent.  I've been going over footage taken from a wedding this weekend and noticed quite a lot of noise and problems with my white balance.  A little depressing after the fact.  So I was upset and disapointed in myself by the quality I had produced and knew it couldn't be the camera.  The sensor is an Exmor APS HD CMOS, and the photos I get look fantastic.  So what's my problem in producing crap footage?  The answer came when I began researching camcorders.

This past weekend was a big learning experience for me.  I realize that I need an extra camcorder to in order to record for extended periods of time, such as a wedding ceremony.  For the event I borrowed my dad's Canon camcorder which was a big help because my a33 overheated probably three times durring the ceremony.  So in researching camcorders I came across shutter speed.  What?  I guess this is the big doofus within, but I had no idea about shutterspeed for camcorders.  I just assumed a shutter was a negated property and that all I ought to focus on were aperture and iso.  Since I've been filming with my camera I've only ever filmed in aperture priority mode.  This is the mode I generally take my pictures with.  So I took my confusion to an expert to be sorted out.

I talked to my friend Ernie who started up a video production business that films music videos.  He mostly uses a 5d and 7d.  He explained the purpose of shutterspeed in relation to video cameras.  I can't exactly relay the entire lesson because I've learned in images and can't exactly put it all to words for you. However a quick trip to wikipedia or around google will solve the issue.  What I took away from it is that the shutter speed is open half the time you are filming.  So if you were to film at 24fps you would use a shutter speed of 1/48th sec.  The a33 only does 1080i which is about 29.7 fps so I need to use a shutterspeed of 1/60th sec.  Which means I need to start shooting in full manual mode, lock my shutterspeed at 1/60, then adjust my iso and aperture as needed.  I also learned from this weekend that any iso setting on my camera above 1600 creates terrible artifacts.

Well, live and learn.

Oyster Bar

My friend Anthony and I found this oyster bar that had burned down.  Great subject for photographs.

Sunset retouch

Photos from the weekend

Had a pretty active weekend.  Already posted photos from the car show.  Sunday I went hiking and Monday I was at a cookout.  Here are my favorite pics from those events.

Photoshop retouching3

Photoshop retouching2

Photoshop retouching

So I'm working with this magazine my sister gave me for my birthday and will be posting before/after images of retouch work with the images in my last post.

Downtown Car Show

Went on a photohunt today with my friend Dito.  We checked out the monthly car show in downtown Mooresville.  These are some of the pics I nabbed.  Would have loved to stay longer but I was about to pass out from the heat.  Way too hot today.