Ed. note: How many times have you taken photos at a concert or festival, only to find that they’re either blurry, too dark or too light? Wouldn’t you love to know which camera is the best one for you? And wouldn’t you love to know how to use that camera correctly? We asked professional photographer Sara Kauss to be our special GACTV.com “How To…” blogger for the next few weeks. Sara has graciously agreed to pass along all of her tips and tricks to YOU, just in time for the CMA Music Festival and summer concert season! Her first post was How To Find the Right Camera for Your Budget. Now that you have that camera, Sara’s going to tell you how to use it to shoot beautiful pictures!

How To…Use Your Camera

Now that you have a camera, I challenge you to take 15 minutes every day and have fun with it!  Every day, practice with a different setting on your camera so you get comfortable. Start with your flash. This is the most critical feature on your camera to master for all photographers, novice and professional. 

Image courtesy of B&HPhotoVideo.com.

Play with your Flash! The little lightning bolt can do lots. Sunday evening, when you’re making dinner indoors with the kids or walking downtown at dusk, try playing with this setting. When you change the lightning bolt to the lightning bolt with the crossed out lightning bolt, the camera will not use the flash in its automatic settings. Under the FUNC/SET button, make sure your camera is set to HIGH ISO. You will want to shoot at the highest ISO possible on your camera in low-light conditions as to provide the least amount of blur in your photos, due to camera shake when holding the camera. 

Low ISO (or Auto ISO) is great for natural light situations, i.e. outdoors. An example of a great time to use Auto ISO is when you’re with friends on the beach or having a picnic in a tree-covered park. The lower the ISO, the more vibrant the colors in your photos will be. However, you can always fix color in photo editing applications – but you cannot fix a blurry photo. 

It is important to remember that flash is what gives you stability in low-light situations, so take a deep breath and hold your camera very steady when shooting without a flash. Or, a simple trick is to set the camera on a ledge, use your 2-second timer setting and let the camera take a photo completely shake-free! The shake of even you breathing can cause blur in your images. 

At a concert, it is important to shoot with the flash off. The flash on a typical point-and-shoot camera when the lens is zoomed out is estimated to reach about six feet. That is not enough power to light an entire stage. Besides, a stage has such great available light highlighting the artists and band, it’s just not needed. If you shoot with your flash, your camera will say to itself “okay, let’s light up everything that is within six feet of me,” which is not enough reach to capture the stage. This is what makes the people’s heads in front of you nice and bright, while the artist singing is still stuck in the dark.

Image courtesy of B&HPhotoVideo.com.

The High-Speed Burst mode is another great setting for concerts. In this mode, your camera is capturing multiple frames per second, 8.2 to be exact (on the Canon Powershot Camera)! As described in the section about not using flash at concerts, hand-holding a camera and having it shake is one of the trickiest parts of low-light photography. By shooting multiple frames per second, you are most likely going to get one of those frames when you are not breathing (and remember, even your breathing can cause camera shake)! So make sure you have plenty of room on your memory card and shoot away! Out of the 100 photos you take, maybe only 10 will be in focus, but those 10 will be great, well-lit photos. 

Image courtesy of B&HPhotoVideo.com.

The Macro setting is a fun one that will give you neat results. Use your macro settings, the little flower icon on your camera.  The little flower setting will give you a fun twist on your photos. Take a close-up photo of your puppy’s nose (if they’ll sit still long enough!) or take an old-fashioned key and watch it fill the screen, making a nifty image. 

Now that you have a camera and are practicing with it, next time we’ll discuss digital developing and how to really make those photos go from average to extraordinary in a few simple iPhoto tweaks!

– Sara Kauss

Photo courtesy of SaraKauss.com

Sara Kauss Photography is an international wedding and portrait photographer. Sara is known for her photojournalistic style and colorful, dynamic photos all captured with a spontaneous, energetic, personality. Sara specializes in destination weddings, concert photography and musician shoots. She also speaks for photographers across the country on how to build a successful photography business and teaches workshops to educate photographers on proper shooting techniques. For more on Sara, visit her official website!

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