Canon EOS 50D questions (lens, process, adjust, photoshop)

[tbird92]

I have just purchased this camara with a Tamron 18-270 lens to take action baseball shots of my son. So far have only used the auto settings as I am very new to photography with a DSL any advice for getting these shots. I have also noticed that the photos are about 5 mg when downloaded to my computer can I make smaller files without losing sharpness on photo. One last question should I shoot in raw or jpeg? Thanks for any help you can offer.

[RayinAK]

Congratulations on your new camera! The 50D is quite a nice.

The photos will be large, regardless. I would shoot RAW, and process them with PhotoShop Elements, or even with the Canon software, then save the images you like to TIFF format (these will be huge). You can always save them to a DVD, and also to an external hard drive to save room in the internal hard drive.

Now, you could always shoot JPEG, but you won't have a lot of control when you process them. If you are worried about photo sizes, then you could always shoot small RAW if that option is available on the 50D.

Now, switch to Av, and then do the following (power switch all the way UP):

1. Select a mode such as Landscapes, and adjust the camera's sharpness one click to the right of the default setting
2. Choose AI-Servo, and then burst mode
3. If you aren't sure if it's going to be sunny or not, choose Auto ISO
4. If not sure of the white balance (Sunny, Shadow, Shade, Night, Tungsten, etc.), choose AWB
5. Choose Center focus
6. Save those settings to one of the user settings (on the 40D, these are C1, C2, and C3). I don't know what the 50D has for you to save to. Once you have saved the data to the mode of your liking, when you get to the place where you are shooting sports, turn the dial to your mode.

-On your mode, when you press and hold the shutter button half-way, the camera autofocuses and maintains the subject in focus as it moves around. Press the shutter button all the way, and the camera will take a series of photos, all in focus. However, you tell the camera which is the subject by placing the red-color square right on the subject, and the camera will focus on that spot.

What I would immediately do is to buy the "Canon EOS 50D" digital photography guide (I don't know the correct title) by David D. Bush. It will save you a whole bunch of time learning how to use your 50D.

[PA2UK]

I have also noticed that the photos are about 5 mg when downloaded to my computer can I make smaller files without losing sharpness on photo.

If you're talking about setting the camera to save smaller files - no, the smaller the file, the less information, the lesser quality image. You can resize the image to web quality afterwards so it's not a huge print quality image when uploading to the web. This will reduce quality (everytime you save/resave a JPG it compresses it more, losing quality) but it should not be noticable if you only resave once and it's only web quality anyway. But if you're talking about print quality images, they have to be big files or there won't be enough info for a quality print.

One last question should I shoot in raw or jpeg?

Only shoot in RAW when you know how to post process in editing software aftewards. RAW is great since it's lossless (no compression like JPG) but it will also look flat and dull compared to a JPG until you edit it yourself. JPGs are quickly auto processed in your camera with some basic contrast, sharpening, etc. RAW does not do this, giving you full control over it, which is great but if you don't know how to edit it, it might be a bit overwhelming.

Alternatively, you can shoot in RAW for the image quality and set some auto processes on it in editing software afterwards if you don't know how to or don't have time to do the editing yourself. But you'd really only be getting half the benefit of shooting in RAW.

Eventually, you should learn how to get the most out of RAW but for now, as a beginner who might be overwhelmed by all this, it's not the end of the world if you shoot in highest quality JPG or shoot in RAW and auto post process them instead of editing manually.

[awp0409]

Now have the Canon 50D and love it. But, have a question. Can anyone tell me how to turn off the red focal points on the LCD monitor screen? I can't find how to do this in the manual, nor do I know how the setting got turned on in the first place. Any help would be appreciated.

[RayinAK]

Originally Posted by awp0409

Now have the Canon 50D and love it. But, have a question. Can anyone tell me how to turn off the red focal points on the LCD monitor screen? I can't find how to do this in the manual, nor do I know how the setting got turned on in the first place. Any help would be appreciated.

It's in the manual somewhere. I don't have a 50D, but a 40D, and here is how I turn them off and on: In the "Playback Menu" I choose "AF Point Disp," and either "Enable" or "Disable."

What these points show you when you playback the images are the areas in focus. The center point has focus priority, but lets say that you have taken a photo of a bunch of flowers with all the AF points selected in the camera. In this case, depending on the lens aperture you selected, not all the flowers will be in focus. When that happens you question the camera's autofocus system and assume it's malfunctioning, but then you look at the focus points on the image you playback, and the camera shows the only focus options it had when taking the photo. Since you didn't tell it to focus on a specific point, it chose the ones with the most contrast. If you have set the lens' aperture so that it can offer the most depth-of-field, then all the flowers will be in focus. In other words, the focus points show on playback when you have enabled them in the Playback Menu, and all they do is to point-out to you the points in the frame that had the most contrast. The best auto-focus is achieved on subjects with the most contrast.

[awp0409]

Thanks! It worked! They are gone now.