Photo taken with a Nikon Coolpix point and shoot

[sashbar]

This photo was taken with a Nikon point and shoot camera, while I was driving on the way back from work on a country road in 2011, of course I slowed down and put my flashers on. I believe I had it on landscape mode, here are the properties: F-stop f/3.1 exposure 1/250 and ISO 125. I don't know much about settings yet need to learn more about it. I did not do any processing at all. I am a noob on here, my first time posting a photo. I received a dslr recently. Any comments welcome, just be gentle with me. Editing allowed.

If you want to learn about settings and just starting, I guess you need to read about the exposure triangle first, which is an easy concept and there is a lot of information on the web. You can start with this reliable source:

Camera Exposure: Aperture, ISO & Shutter Speed

It will take just a day to figure it out and then some time to try different modes.

Then you will need to learn about the exposure compensation, which is a little bit more tricky, but important. Your image looks underexposed because it has quite a bit of white reflective surfaces that fool your camera ( any camera) into "thinking" that the scene is brighter than it really is. That is why the snow looks gray instead of white. It is not the camera's fault, any camera would underexpose this. I do not know Coolpix cameras, but there should be an exposure compensation control.

Then you will need to learnd about different types of scenes and how to expose it. Some are easy to expose, others are more difficult. You can entirely rely on your camera metering, which will give you acceptable results most of the time or you can correct it in post production, but if you master your exposure skills the quality of your pictures will be much higher, because under- and overexposure not only makes it darker or brighter, it affects colors amongst other things, and to complicate it even more - it will affect different colors differently.
This particular scene does not look difficult to expose, because the dynamic range should be within your sensor capabilities, it is a sort of a bright image with all the key tones fitting into your sensor range. But it needs some exposure compensation. How much? This is up to you to learn the above figure out. It is not difficult.

 

[annamaria]

Thank you sash for the advice and comments much appreciated. I took this photo through the windshield while in my car. Not a smart move I know, but I just had to take the photo. Smiles. How long have you been shooting? I will definitely look into the info you sent.

 

[sashbar]

Thank you sash for the advice and comments much appreciated. I took this photo through the windshield while in my car. Not a smart move I know, but I just had to take the photo. Smiles. How long have you been shooting? I will definitely look into the info you sent.

You are welcome. Effectively I have been shooting for just under a year - I bought my first DSLR last Xmas. I had cameras before, including the old film ones, but had never really been into it, never loked the darkroom and never ventured outside AUTO mode. Last December I decided to take it a bit more seriously as a hobby and it changed my photography completely, even though with two kids I have very little time for this hobby. You can check my flkr for some of the images I took this year. (Need to clean it of some pretty average ones) But all in all is not difficult if you put just a bit of effort. Even as a beginner one is capable of producing some decent results with this hobby. I am not into landscapes though..
Flickr: sashbar's Photostream

 

[annamaria]

You are welcome. Effectively I have been shooting for just under a year - I bought my first DSLR last Xmas. I had cameras before, including the old film ones, but had never really been into it, never loked the darkroom and never ventured outside AUTO mode. Last December I decided to take it a bit more seriously as a hobby and it changed my photography completely, even though with two kids I have very little time for this hobby. You can check my flkr for some of the images I took this year. (Need to clean it of some pretty average ones) But all in all is not difficult if you put just a bit of effort. Even as a beginner one is capable of producing some decent results with this hobby. I am not into landscapes though.. Flickr: sashbar's Photostream

I am on my way to work now and will look at your photos later on when I get back. Thanks for the link.