Squirrel picture needs comments

[Ron Evers]

Be careful Anisha, the settings I use are conditions specific & only work for the existing light @ the time. If the light changes so do the settings.

 

[Anisha Kaul]

Yes, I'll use those settings in the sunlight

 

[vtf]

The squirrel blends into the limb with almost identical colors and is soft/oof. To capture wildlife your shutter needs to be at 1/200 or 1/250, yours was at 1/40. Your aperature was at 6.3, any lower would've caused issues with focusing around those limbs (since your shot the focus seems on the limb in front not the squirrel). Higher iso would maybe help but also the noise would've hindered further any separation of the squirrel from the limb. Lastly you could use the on board flash,but if you're further away than lets say 8' the flash wont help. If you had a flash light or similiar that could've been shown on it then maybe but overall I think the lighting was just terrible for the power of you camera to handle.
You cant make artificial stuff come out of the camera, it is what it is. For example using flash is a technique not artificial.
The unnatural comes from afterwards from pp.
Keep practicing, it'll get better.:thumbup:

 

[Anisha Kaul]

Vtf,

Wow, so you could guess the settings?? My next photo will be according to the settings shown in this thread, so probably something better might come out!

By artificial I meant, that the light is dim but you set the flash and other settings such that it doesn't appear to be dim?? It seems to me like trick photography!

Thanks for the comments/suggestions.

 

[vtf]

Vtf,

Wow, so you could guess the settings?? My next photo will be according to the settings shown in this thread, so probably something better might come out!

By artificial I meant, that the light is dim but you set the flash and other settings such that it doesn't appear to be dim?? It seems to me like trick photography!

Thanks for the comments/suggestions.

The whole word of photography is about lighting, iso, aperature, shutter, flash and adjusting the usage of each for the given situation is techniques of photography. Your image could not have improved without the use of flash, in fact I would think the lighting was as good as a normal lit room in which case flash is needed.
Now having said that, given a more powerful camera, better quality lens, a camera that can handle the noise of higher iso better you can take a better image in lower light without flash but its my assumption that you wish to work with what you have at the moment.
If you limit your ability of using flash, there will be a whole world out there untouched by you.
BTW I use opanda exif viewer to see your data, I simply right click on the image.

 

[Dao]

It is not because of the manual mode unless you know what setting you really need. Most of the photographers rely on the light meter to determine the correct exposure. However, if the light meter give you a wrong reading (because it does not know what you really want to capture), auto or manual mode will yield the same result since it based on the same light meter readings.

However, based your experience (like from this photo), you know the camera light meter (in matrix mode) will give you a underexpose photo, so next time you may dial the exposure compensation to +1 or +2 (if your camera has this feature). And if your camera also has a "Spot Meter", the light meter readings maybe more accurate in this situation.

Thank you for the constructive suggestion, I'll read and check up all this with my camera.

Let me give you a little more hints.
As you can see in your photo. The background are bright white and the subject and tree branches are dark. But overall is a little on the bright side. Since your camera light meter mode is in Matrix mode. So it thought the scene you were going to take was bright. So it adjusted the settings for you based on the "OVERALL" scene.

Spot meter is good for situation like this since the camera only meter the light in the center point, which is the subject. Therefore, the camera will choose the exposure settings based on the subject. Therefore the subject will be exposed correctly. But the white background will be overexposed.

 

[atristica]

Nice shot

 

[Anisha Kaul]

As you can see in your photo. The background are bright white and the subject and tree branches are dark. But overall is a little on the bright side.

I did notice that early, I was surprised.

Since your camera light meter mode is in Matrix mode. So it thought the scene you were going to take was bright. So it adjusted the settings for you based on the "OVERALL" scene.

Spot meter is good for situation like this since the camera only meter the light in the center point, which is the subject.

I previously didn't comment on this since I do not know what a spot meter is
So I looked up the specifications of this camera,
Metering:
• Evaluative (linked to Face Detection AF frame)
• Center-weighted average
• Spot (center or linked to Face Detection)

here.

I will see how these settings work, only then I can actually understand the technical depth of your post.

Now I am thankful to you for explaining these minute details :hug:: :hattip:

-Anisha