Table of contents for Nikon For Beginners in Nikon for Beginners

Just got your first Nikon camera? Or looking to buy one soon? Maybe you’re just hoping to improve your camera skills and get back to basics. Nikon for Beginners is a 180-page guide containing everything you need to know to get to grips with your Nikon DSLR and take better pictures. Being good at the basics will help you improve quicker at the harder stuff as you progress later. We’ve included an in-depth guide to Nikon camera functions as well as informative explanations about settings and shooting technique. Learn to capture stunning landscapes, perfect portraits and sharper shots. Follow our in-depth step-by-step tutorials on everything from composition to simple studio setups, macro and so much more. If that wasn’t enough delve into our troubleshooting section where we identify common mistakes…

When using high resolution cameras, it is essential to pair these with high quality lenses, as any deficit in sharpness will become immediately obvious. Arguably, the optics of a system are the most important components, since without ‘good glass’ the effective resolution of any sensor cannot be realised. Luckily, Nikon lenses use a variety of advanced optical designs and technologies, for maximum sharpness and functionality. The baseline defence against optical distortions are Extra-low Dispersion and aspherical glass (see annotations) but there are many other features employed by Nikon. Many lenses use the company’s exclusive Super Integrated Coating (SIC) – a multi-layered coating, which is applied to lens surfaces for improved colour reproduction. Fluorite and Fluorine are two incredibly popular materials in photographic lens construction, for increased clarity and grease resistance…

Honestly, have you ever read a camera manual from cover to cover? Many have tried, but few have succeeded! There’s something about those pocket-sized pages of dull grey images and complicated diagrams and figures that makes the information hard to digest. And the problem is, in detailing every single feature, information overload quickly creeps in. Most of us just want to know a few fundamentals, and then pick up everything else as we go. The crux of it is figuring out what those fundamentals are. Nobody would want a camera that has three buttons. We like our gear to have a depth of features that slowly unravel their secrets over several months or even years. But the flip side is that, when you have an unfamiliar new camera, the buttons,…

Your journey around the body of your Nikon DSLR continues with the rear side. Here’s where you’ll spend the majority of your time, looking through the viewfinder, selecting menu settings, or reviewing images, so it will stand you in good stead to know your way around the buttons and controls. Get to know the viewfinder, too – it’s more than just a compositional tool. It offers a wealth of exposure data along the bottom of the screen that adapts to the amount of light in the frame, so it’s a great aid when learning about exposure. Did you know? It’s a myth that shooting video requires faster memory cards than shooting stills. A burst of RAW files requires greater transfer speed than a short video…

One of the most enticing things about photography is that it’s such an easy hobby to start. Yet it offers untold depth to those who choose to look for it. Anybody can take a picture, and almost everybody you know has a camera in their pocket. But just a little extra knowledge is all it takes to separate the real enthusiast from the occasional snapper. The crash course we’ve lined up for you over the following pages puts the focus on the fundamental aspects of photography that matter most. Dive in!…

Wide Angle Shorter lenses fit more of the scene in the frame The angle of view of a lens is determined by its focal length. Wide-angle lenses have a focal length of 24mm or below and let you fit more of a scene into the frame. They’re useful for shooting landscapes or architecture. But wide-angle lenses also exaggerate perspective and create distortion, which can be unflattering if you’re shooting people close-up. Telephoto Longer lenses get you closer to distant subjects A telephoto lens (anything above a focal length of 85mm) gives a tight angle of view. This enables you to zoom in to distant details or focus attention on a small portion of a scene. Backgrounds are also blurred when using a telephoto, because of the longer focal length. Longer…

The world is a big place, so it’s best to have a rough shooting area in mind when you start your research (whether this is a holiday destination, or somewhere closer to home). Your local area might seem dull and familiar, so try looking at it from another point of view. What spots would you recommend to a fellow photographer if they were visiting? If you’re able and willing to head somewhere more exotic, you can glean location ideas from travel brochures and guides. Make use of online photo communities for inspiration too. The Flickr World Map (www.flickr.com/map) allows you to scroll around and find photos that have been uploaded and geotagged, and you can enter your own location to narrow the results down. 500px (www.500px.com) is a stunning inspiration…

There’s no such thing as bad weather (for landscape photography, at least). Even in the rain, it’s possible to capture stunning images that still have a hint of summer about them. Try to include seasonal clues in the foreground of your images, such as floral details or vegetation. Poppies and sunflowers are quintessential summer blooms which will add a bold splash of colour. Despite its sunny disposition, the summer season also has a darker side – thunderstorms. Lightning presents dynamic photo opportunities, but only if you can capture it quickly enough. The specific camera settings needed depend on the time of day and your location, but as a general rule, set your lens to manual focus and focus it at infinity. In Bulb mode, start with an aperture of around…

01 Set Manual mode Switch to Manual mode for full control of your exposure and Spot metering. Dial in your desired aperture and ISO. These values will depend on the scene, but start at around f11 and ISO100. 02 Take two readings Set the AF point manually, then position the focus point over an area of shadow. Note the recommended shutter speed. Repeat this step to meter the brightest part of the scene. 03 Find the average Find the middle shutter speed between the two readings. For example, between 1/160 sec and 1/640 sec would be 1/320 sec. Shoot at this shutter speed and then review the image histogram. Avoid dust spots Dust spots become very obvious when you’ve stopped down to narrow apertures (higher f-numbers) and are shooting a…

Your camera can focus faster and more accurately than you ever can: the problem is that it doesn’t know what part of the scene you want it to focus on. The default setting for most cameras is that the camera will automatically choose which focus sensor to use, which governs where the focus will fall. If you are photographing a subject away from the camera, in the centre of frame, in bright light and with a narrow aperture, then the camera might choose the right focus. If you are being more creative, shooting closer, with the subject towards the edge of the frame and with a shallower depth of field, then there is a good chance that your camera will focus on the wrong object in the frame – this…

Set the correct shutter speed Even if you have accurately focused on your subject, you can still ruin the sharpness with even the slightest camera shake. This is where the camera moves during the exposure, but the shutter speed is not fast enough to avoid showing the movement. Camera shake can look like a slight ghosting on your image, and although Adobe has a camera shake reduction filter in Photoshop, you’ll want to try and avoid it in the first place. A rule of thumb is that you should try to use a shutter speed equal to, or higher than, the focal length of the lens – for a 200mm lens, try to use 1/250 sec; or up to a stop higher at 1/500 sec if you are using a…

Using our hyperfocal charts (or a smartphone app) gives the distance to focus at from the focal plane of the camera, so that everything between it and ‘infinity’ will appear sharp. However, because depth of field stretches in front of the hyperfocal distance point, as well as beyond it, objects up to around half this distance will appear acceptably sharp, too. So if you were to use a 50mm focal length focused at 14 metres away at f5.6 on a fullframe camera, a subject between roughly seven and 14 metres away would also appear acceptably sharp – enabling you to get more benefit from the depth of field.…

Typically, traditional coastal and landscape shots are usually taken with a wide-angle focal length and narrow aperture, such as 24mm and f16. This ensures you can capture a large part of the scene, and make sure that it’s all perfectly sharp, from the foreground to the horizon. However, in this project, we’re going to show you how creative your scenic shots can look if you do the complete opposite. We’re at Weston-super-Mare, just before sunset, to capture the Grand Pier in all its glory. We’re using a fast 50mm f1.4 lens for this as we want to use the widest possible aperture to capture a very shallow depth of field, but any reasonably long lens with a wide aperture capability will work fine for this. The longer focal length and…

There was a time where we had to manually focus our lenses. And before that, in the very earliest days of photography, cameras had no control over focusing at all. You’d have to be more of a scientist than an artist to set up a shot, positioning the camera to focus it, but today we have it easy since the introduction of autofocus. Autofocus works as soon as you depress the shutter release button halfway (or use a button on the back of your Nikon, if set up). It analyses the scene in front of you and makes adjustments in the focus of the lens until things are nice and sharp. It’s a huge step up from where photography was when it started out, but autofocus still struggles in low…

Photography is all about light: its direction, angle, quality and strength. Scenes can look very different under varied lighting conditions and, as any landscape photographer knows, the most attractive natural light occurs at the start and end of the day. Not only does the low angle of the sun create pockets of light and shade that reveal the contours of a landscape, its rays have to pass through more of the earth’s atmosphere, causing the light to take on the warm qualities that result in vibrant sunrises and sunsets. If you can work out how the light will behave in advance, you’ll have a huge advantage when shooting landscapes. This is where technology can help. With a smartphone, all the information you need is at your fingertips. In the last…

Tilt-shift lenses – Nikon calls them Perspective Control, lenses – have their origins in large-format cameras which feature a lens at one end and a sheet of film or sensor at the other, and a flexible bellows in between that allows both to be moved independently. The advantage of this, at least for architectural photography, is that the lens can be ‘shifted’ so that the sensor covers the top of a tall building without having to tilt the camera upwards. Here’s how it works: you start by pointing the lens horizontally at a building, so that the verticals are perfectly vertical. At this stage, your frame will include the ground in the bottom half of the frame, and the building in the top (assuming you’re shooting from street level). But…

Photographers often obsess about detail, sharpness and resolution. But simplicity can be just as powerful. By paring down images to the bare elements we can create beautiful, minimalist artwork. In this project we’ll show you how, from setting up and shooting long exposures, to stripping out the colour for a gorgeous monochrome finish. There are few things that highlight the engineered magic of photography more than a long exposure. When we stretch out our shutter speeds to several seconds, or even minutes, any motion in the scene is recorded as a beautiful silky blur. The ability it gives us to present everyday scenes in a completely different way can be hugely effective. It gives them a surreal, calm quality that feels minimalist. This is because, for certain scenes, the smoothing…

If you’re planning a long trip abroad, chances are you’re looking to ensure your kit is completely dust-free and ready to go the minute you step off the plane. There are a few simple jobs to perform before you pack. The external areas of your camera are simple enough to manage, as they’re tough and you can be rougher and less careful with them than you need to be with the inside of your camera. As long as you’re careful enough with sticky substances and food on fingers, it’s also extremely unlikely that the body of the camera and lens will pick up too much that will affect your usage. That said, it’s still worth wiping the camera over and checking the contacts for any obvious problems. Any particles removed…

Taking clear action shots of fast-paced sports, such as rally racing, may sound hard, especially with everything zipping by so quickly, but it is possible. Breathe, take time to enjoy it and to plan your shots, and you’ll get a selection of photographs to be proud of. You’ll need to keep your Nikon steady and smooth. Panning is also an important technique to master, and the right shutter speed is key to achieving an image that is not only sharp, but that also gives a sense of speed. We went to leg nine of the 2016 World Rally Championships in Trier, Germany, to take our shots. This event boasts the best drivers and vehicles in the world, tearing around at breakneck speeds, but you should be able to shoot similar…

When you’re shooting at a stunning location it’s easy to lose yourself in the moment and, before you know it, the light starts fading. However, just because the sun goes down there’s no need to head home. As long as the moon is fairly full and the sky is clear, you can continue shooting well into the night. This involves a very long exposure. We’re not talking a few seconds here – more like a few minutes. Aside from the need for a tripod and remote release, we also have to be able to expose correctly for the moonlight. Our camera’s Bulb mode is key to this – it lets us keep the shutter open as long as we like. But how do we work out the correct exposure length…

We often think of twilight as the most atmospheric part of the day for photography. However, after dark can also be a wonderful time to head out with the camera, especially in a busy urban setting. Coloured lighting from shop windows, passing traffic and neon signage can make for interesting and unique backdrops when shooting portraits. So in this project we’ll explore a few techniques for portraits after dark. We’ll begin by looking at how to use available lights around us, then we’ll go on to explain how to supplement the street lights with our own lighting. The biggest hurdle to overcome on a shoot like this is the dark. It means setting up our camera for low-light photography.For a static subject we could simply use a tripod and elongate…

The Effects and Detail panels are two features of Lightroom CC that, although not new, work together seamlessly to powerfully alter the final image. They combine a lot of useful but incremental adjustments that include changing contrast, sharpness and noise for a drastically different photograph. You might find these areas useful when working on a photo like ours here – something hazy, distant, lacking contrast or definition. Sometimes haze can enhance an image, but in this case we have two people towards the right of the frame we want to highlight. The mountains behind the subjects are covered with cloud, which makes them less impressive. So we’re going to give this shot a boost of sharpness for a more striking, visually appealing result. “We’re going to give this shot a…

Stretch an exposure to several seconds or more and the movement of clouds is captured as a beautiful silky blur. It’s one of the landscape photographer’s most potent visual devices, but it requires a tripod and a strong neutral density filter. If you don’t have this gear to hand, you can recreate the look with simple Photoshop skills. The long-exposure, blurred-clouds look goes well with a moody black-and-white treatment. So we’ll begin by converting our image to monochrome. There are many ways to remove colour in Photoshop, but one of the most powerful is found within the Camera Raw plug-in. Here we can strip out the colour while controlling the brightness of eight colour ranges, so we can fine-tune the brightness of green grass, blues skies and any other colours…

Choosing a DSLR camera is a big decision. You are committing to a camera system, which represents a significant financial investment. Due to issues of compatibility of lenses, flashes and accessories, when you have actually purchased your new camera, you will be unable to use your products on other brands of equipment, meaning you need to be completely comfortable with your choice. Nikon is a company with a long history of pioneering photographic technology, having been an industry leader for a century. Today it is seen as one of the ‘big two’ camera manufacturers, in competition with Canon. While every brand produces high quality cameras and lenses, the Nikon system is popular for several main reasons. From a handling perspective, even entry level Nikon DSLRs feel rugged and well balanced,…

The wealth of options in your Nikon DSLR’s menu may at first glance seem a little overwhelming, but there are really only a few key settings you initially need to think about.In fact, once the camera is set up, it’s surprising how rarely you’ll need to enter the menus at all, because most of the key settings can be accessed with the buttons and dials on the camera body. The six steps below reveal the most important settings you need to tweak when you switch on your camera for the first time, or next time… New DSLR? Here’s what to tweak in its menus 01 Set the date and time Setup>Time zone and date The date and time of the capture will be embedded in the metadata of every photo…

For those of us who remember shooting on film, the LCD screen was perhaps the greatest thing about the digital camera revolution. Suddenly, we could see the image we’d taken in a split second, rather than days later. Of course, it seems normal now, but it’s still encouraging to think back to those days when analysing and troubleshooting was so much trickier. Whether reviewing images or using Live View, the technical side of photography is easier than it’s ever been, and it’s all thanks to the LCD. Active D-Lighting In high-contrast scenes such as on a bright sunny day, or if your subject is against a bright backdrop, it can be hard to record detail in both the shadows and highlights. Often you have to compromise and go for one…

Aperture This alters the size of the lens opening to allow more or less light through When we focus on a point in a scene, there will be an area in front and behind the point that also appears sharp. This is the depth of field. It can be expanded or contracted using the aperture, an adjustable opening in a lens that channels light through to the sensor. Aperture sizes are referred to as f-numbers, such as f8. A wide aperture (eg f2.8) lets in more light and produces a limited plane of focus (useful for blurring backgrounds or shooting in low light). A narrow aperture (eg f16) restricts the light and records a greater expanse of sharpness. Shutter speed This determines the length of time the sensor is exposed…

The Rule Of Thirds Divide a scene into three and place subject(s) on the lines This is a classic technique that works well when the scene has a single, easily definable subject. Place the subject on one of the third lines in the image. Visually, this is more interesting than plonking it in the middle of the frame. For landscapes, place the horizon line on a third. Like all ‘rules’ of composition, don’t be afraid to break it if it leads to a more interesting image. Leading Lines Look for lines that point towards your subject Straight or bendy, you’ll find lines everywhere: roads, rivers, fences, walls, trees, skies… The viewer’s eye will naturally be drawn along the lines, so position the subject so the lines lead towards it. With…

01 Shoot In Raw To get the best out of your camera, and to give yourself more of a safety net for exposure, set your camera to shoot in Raw format, or Raw and JPEG at the same time. 02 Download To Your Computer Get yourself a memory card reader for convenience when downloading cards. Some software, such as Lightroom, can be set up to detect cards and begin downloading for you. 03 Back Up Computer hard disk drives are delicate and can fail at any time, so always store a backup of your images on an external hard drive. It’s a small extra outlay of time and money in exchange for peace of mind – and one day it might save your photos. 04 Open Lightroom/Adobe Camera Raw You’ll…

Portraiture offers a real test of a photographer’s technical skill, creativity and charisma that sets it apart from other genres of photography. There’s nothing quite like coming away from a portrait shoot knowing you’ve nailed every aspect of the challenge – the camera settings, the lighting, the composition, and the subject’s character. When everything comes together in one harmonious frame, the results can be spectacular. However, anyone who’s tried their hand at portraiture has also probably experienced the crushing disappointment that comes when grumpy subjects, technical slip-ups or misjudged lighting spoil a shot.Both technically and artistically, there’s always plenty to think about on a portrait shoot. And then there’s the other X factor: the connection between the subject and the photographer. But if you can head into a shoot armed…

Control depth of field If you don’t have adequate depth of field in your picture, then vital parts of the scene will be out of focus. For instance, you might be photographing two people who are equally important, but only one of them is sharp. If they’re of equal importance, odds are you’ll want them both as sharp as possible. The most effective way to control depth of field is through the aperture you select. The smaller the aperture (the larger the aperture number like f11) the broader the depth of field – or the area in front of and behind the point of focus that is also sharp. If you use a wider aperture (designated by smaller numbers like f4) then you’ll get a shallower depth of field. Other…

The first thing we generally want to learn about in photography is how to use the camera and lens. But after this, it’s important to start growing artistically. So step away from the tedium of tech specs and instead learn about how to compose your images properly. A well-composed shot will make it easy for the viewer to identify a subject, it will retain their attention and might even tell them a story. So where do we start, what do we include and how can we use a few simple techniques to form the initial structure of an image? Follow these steps to anchor your shots before you experiment further. “Step away from the tedium of tech specs and instead learn about how to compose your images properly” Step by…

Aneutral density filter attaches to your lens and performs a simple function: it blocks the flow of light into your camera. There are a couple of reasons why we might want to do this. Firstly, at times when we want a shallower depth of field, it allows us to use a wider aperture without having to adjust the shutter speed. Secondly – and this is the most common reason – we use them to extend our shutter speed in order to blur motion. By extending the shutter speed we can create beautiful blurred motion within our scenes. Blur can be a great mood-setter for all kinds of shots. For portraits it can help to create a sense of speed or motion. And for landscapes it can render clouds and water…

Your Nikon’s metering system plays a vital role in picture-taking. It works out how much light should enter the camera to make a correct exposure. Be warned, though: it’s very clever, but it’s not completely foolproof. The problem with metering is that it takes an average reading (either of the entire frame or part of it, depending on which metering mode you’re in), and this reading is assumed to be a midtone, halfway between white and black. More often than not this assumption comes out right, but the metering system can struggle when a frame is dominated by areas of extreme brightness or darkness. For example, imagine a person standing in the snow wearing a white coat. The frame will be dominated by whites, but your metering system doesn’t know…

We photographers have a bit of a love/hate relationship with movement. Sometimes it’s a real pain and we strive to keep it to a minimum. At other times, we want to celebrate it in all its blurry glory. The motion of traffic at night definitely falls into the latter category. By using a long exposure in the low evening light, the smooth motion of their lights creates wonderful streaks of colour through the frame. This is one of those camera skills that reveals the magic of photography – and the best part is, it’s easy! Anyone with a DSLR and tripod can do it. As such, it’s a great way to get started with longexposure photography as there’s no need for extra filters or even a cable release. The challenge…

We’re going to show you how to go guerilla-style and make your own macro lighting set-up that will work anywhere, at any time, and save space in your camera bag, as well as being relatively cheap. There’s no need for clunky ring flashes, or dual flash heads that sit on the end of your lens. You need just one flashgun, a Nikon DSLR, a lens, a flash bracket, a wired flash trigger and a light diffuser to make a robust, mobile, macro studio. Diffusing the light is the extra step that will enable you to take a studio-like portrait of your macro subject. You can mount everything together using the flash bracket and can lock in the settings you need to get perfect results every time. Here’s how it’s done……

Here we’re taking it back to basics with a cheap-as-chips lighting trick for great macro photos. You can lock away your light stand and flashgun for a well-deserved break; all you need for this fun tutorial are your camera’s pop-up flash, an empty crisps can and a bit of tissue paper. You’ll also need very basic DIY skills – we’ll be getting crafty with scissors and cutting the can down to size before fixing it to your camera with rubber bands – but the quality of light that’s funnelled onto the subject is worth the minimal effort involved. “The quality of light that’s funnelled onto the subject is worth the minimal effort involved” Step by step Funnel your flash 01 Set up your camera Turn your Nikon to manual mode…

Ever wondered how to create those water drops that seem to magically hang in mid-air? It’s not Photoshop trickery; you just need some simple ingredients to concoct your very own drop shot. The principle is simple; by releasing a drip into a bowl full of water you can create a perfect spherical splash with concentric ripples that propagate outwards. With the camera set to the flash’s sync speed, it’s not the shutter that freezes the water drop but the flash of light. A typical burst of flash lasts between 1/30000 and 1/1000 sec, which is much faster than any shutter speed. It’s all in the timing, You’ll need to fire the shutter a fraction of a second after releasing the water drop. This comes with practice – and luck. You’ll…

Think about those images we’ve seen from the Hubble Space Telescope where nebulae, distant stellar nurseries, form new stars in the universe. Well, those same laws of motion can be seen here on earth. Sit down for a cup of tea and you’ll surely have noticed the wonderful swirling patterns created underneath the surface as the milk is poured in. In fact, what if our cup of tea was made of glass? We could watch it unfurl in the water in real time. Well, by turning that glass into a glass fish tank and changing the tea to paint, we suddenly have a much more photographable subject. Once lit, we can freeze this flow of paint mid-motion with our Nikon camera and capture a slice of time. All it takes…

When importing photos into Lightroom CC, the first thing you’ll want to do is begin processing the images. On the right side, under the Edit panel, the first set of edit controls available reside in the Light panel – aptly named, for it allows you to control the light levels of the photograph. From here it’s possible to adjust overall Exposure (brightness) of your image, alter Contrast, control Highlights, lift or reduce Shadows, and adjust the Whites and Blacks sliders. If you have an underexposed image, it’s possible to increase the exposure and save an image that otherwise would be lost. However, the controls should be used sparingly, for if you’ve underexposed an image, even if you can retrieve that data through, say, increasing the exposure by a stop or…

Online galleries and portfolios provide quick and easy ways to share your images, but your photos are vulnerable to theft on the Internet. By shooting a photo you automatically own its copyright, but once it’s been downloaded and reposted to other sites, prospective clients won’t necessarily know who the photograph belongs to. This might result in a photo being used without anyone crediting or paying you. However, you can digitally assign your copyright and contact details to a photo’s metadata, so that this important information will always be attached to the image. This helps potential clients contact you if they want to use the image in any way. But while embedding copyright info into metadata is useful, people can still ignore it and make an unauthorized print of your image.…

There are plenty of techniques for sharpening your photos, but few are as effective as High Pass sharpening. This method makes use of Photoshop’s High Pass Filter, which separates an image into high frequency and low frequency detail. It effectively allows us to target the edges in an image – where light pixels meet darker pixels and apply contrast to them, resulting in crisper and sharper details. The High Pass technique is especially suitable for localised sharpening of specific areas of an image. If you think about it, when an image has out-of-focus, detail-less areas (as is often the case with macro photos) there’s really no need to apply universal sharpening to these areas, as all we end up doing is amplifying the image noise – not ideal at all.…

01 Not taking control of the AF point Don’t leave it up to the camera to decide where to focus. It won’t know which feature you want to be sharp in the picture, and if there’s something in front of the main subject, or the background is detailed, or there’s not a great deal of contrast between the main subject and the rest of the picture, then your Nikon may focus on these and not the subject. You’ll get more consistent results if you tell your Nikon which part of the frame you want to focus on. For absolute precision, choose a single AF point. The centre spot is the most sensitive, although not bestplaced for the most dynamic compositions. For an off-centre subject, you’ll need to use the ‘focus…

As one of the most comprehensive systems, there is a Nikon DSLR for users of any skill level. From the entry level D3400 or D5600, through to the semi-professional D7500 and D750, to the top-of the range D850 and D5, the varied specifications allow a highly tailored approach to buying. One of the first choices a prospective Nikon user must make is whether to invest in a DX or an FX format body. Traditionally beginners would start with the smaller, DX sensor format due to the more economical price, lower weight and dimensions and more manageable specification. Since full frame/FX is preferred by professionals, these cameras tend to feature a potentially daunting number of advanced features, which can make the introduction to DSLR photography less enjoyable. The FX sensors do…

Photography is all about light – this is a phrase you’ll hear again and again. But it’s also about how you harness and channel that light on to your camera’s sensor. The top view of your DSLR gives you the controls to do this. The button layout varies between different Nikon models, but there are fundamental settings and controls that are universal to all of them, such as the essential PASM exposure modes, invaluable controls such as exposure compensation, and the all-important shutter-release button. Did you know? Most Nikons offer a shortcut for formatting memory cards – hold down the two buttons marked ‘Format’ for a couple of seconds, then when ‘For’ flashes in the display, press them both again…

HOW IT WORKS Imagine that aperture, shutter speed, and ISO are three sides of a triangle. If we alter one element, then we have to compensate by adjusting at least one of the other two. For example, a wide aperture and a short shutter speed might produce the same exposure as a narrow aperture with a longer shutter speed, but the resulting images will be different. Widening the aperture allows more light through, so we compensate either with a short shutter speed to keep the capture of light brief, or a low ISO to make the sensor less sensitive to the light that hits it. The longer the shutter is open, the more light shines through. So to prevent overexposure, we compensate either by narrowing the aperture to reduce the…

The great thing about shooting in the summer months is the long days and amount of daylight available for you to take advantage of. During the day, however, metering can become tricky. Have you ever looked onto a glimmering ocean view, gone to capture it with your camera, and been disappointed by the result? This is because the human eye can see the equivalent of about 14 f-stops of dynamic range, while Nikon DSLRs are limited to around eight. Don’t be disheartened though. As long as you choose the right subject to photograph (under the right conditions), the season can be just as rewarding as any other. Here, we’ll encourage you to shoot throughout the day – including in the harsh, high and bright midday light. You could try to…

It would seem as if everything is on your side in summer: fair weather, clear skies and long days. However, as soon as the sun does rise, it rises high and fast in the sky. The morning shadows quickly retreat, and this diminishes any sense of depth in the landscape. At the same time, contrast can be a big challenge for accurate exposure. There’s nothing inherently wrong with photographing in high-contrast conditions, but they can be very hard to meter for. In Matrix metering mode your Nikon’s meter will measure the light intensity across the whole of the image frame, then come up with an average value. In bright, contrasty conditions, this often renders your actual subject too bright or dark. If you switch to Spot metering mode, bear in…

While a warming summer landscape is pleasing to the eye, there’s always scope to try something more dynamic. We’ve already touched on using a telephoto lens to compress the perspective of a landscape, but bear in mind how your shooting angle can also affect the result. Crouching down low in foliage or flowers gives a much more intimate feel. So, too, does widening the aperture and throwing the foreground or background out of focus. For a really drastic look, give infrared a go (above). Blue skies and fluffy white clouds look great with this effect, as the harsh and contrasting sunlight creates a surreal, bleached look. Get abstract Don’t be scared to fill the frame with land and ignore the sky completely. With a longer lens, use repetitive lines or…

When you are shooting in the Raw format, you have a wide latitude for correcting your exposures. Even quite significant over- and underexposure can be rectified, and as long as you crop loosely, then you can also always improve your composition in postproduction. One thing that you can’t do though – in spite of a number of Photoshop forthcoming feature teaser videos – is successfully deblur an unsharp image. If you don’t get your picture sharp in camera then there is pretty much nothing that you can do, other than just deleting it. The problem is compounded by the increasing resolution of digital cameras, which are better than ever at resolving detail. Which also means that they are merciless at showing up any inconsistencies with quality or technique. When I…

Although I predominately use the Single-point AF or Auto-area AF, you might find one of the other AF-area modes are more suited to your style of photography. Although not every camera will have all of these modes, the other potential Nikon focus areas are as follows. These explanations are based on the camera being set to the AF-C (Continuous-servo AF) mode. It is worth experimenting to see which of these modes will work for your camera and style of photography. Single-point AF A single focus sensor is active, and the camera will focus on whatever it falls over. The active sensor can be changed using the Multi Selector. 3D-tracking AF Similar to Single-point AF, a single sensor is active, and the active sensor can be changed using the Multi Selector.…

Invest in the kit In the drive for sharper images, you have to accept that quality will cost. There is a reason why most kit lenses are virtually given away with a camera body! They will never be as sharp as a more expensive (and heavy) professional lens. Be realistic about the level of sharpness that you will be able to achieve with the kit that you can afford in the beginning. It used to be that the only way to get top-quality optics was to stick to the manufacturer’s lenses; these days, though, some of the sharpest lenses are from third-party manufacturers. Notably the Sigma Art range offers incredibly sharp lenses for competitively keen prices. Regularly edit images Always edit your photos as soon as possible; by doing so…

Getting your landscapes sharp from front to back is tricky, but exploiting a phenomenon of depth of field can help you get a tack-sharp scene every time. Depth of field is the distance either side of the focal point that is ‘acceptably sharp’; it’s determined by aperture, focus distance and focal length, and – crucially – it extends twice as far beyond the focus point as it does in front. The point of using hyperfocal distance focusing is to focus at the point at which the depth of field stretches to ‘infinity’ so that the maximum possible amount of the scene appears sharp. You get a greater depth of field at shorter focal lengths and narrower apertures, so if you shoot at an aperture of f16 on a 16mm wide-angle…

Here are tables for both full-frame and APS-C sensors. Select your focal length along the top, and your aperture down the side, to see how far from the camera you should focus, in metres, for maximum sharpness all the way to the horizon. You’ll notice that at very wide angles and narrow apertures, hyperfocal distance is much less than metre. For an interactive hyperfocal distance chart, visit the following link: http://bit.ly/hypercalc FULL-FRAME (FX) SENSOR TABLE APS-C (DX) SENSOR TABLE To infinity and beyond Infinity is the point beyond which everything appears at equal sharpness. It varies according to focal length, but can be as little as a few centimetres away on a wide-angle lens. When you focus at the hyperfocal distance, not only is everything from half this distance up…

Whether or not you’re into meteorology, learning how to photograph clouds will improve your landscape photography no end. The majority of landscape photographs have sky in them, so why not use a filter to improve the tone, detail and contrast? Gone are the days of yellow and red filters on the ends of our lenses – used to darken blue skies on black-and-white film – as we can easily emulate these options in-camera. In terms of physical filters, however, the polariser is one of only a few left in the digital age that cannot be reproduced in-camera or on a computer. Polarisers work by filtering light reflected at certain angles, letting light pass through the lens in some directions while blocking others. This means when you’re shooting water, glass or…

Getting an even exposure across a very wide-angle landscape shot can be challenging, especially if you’re working in bright sunlight, when contrast is likely to be more pronounced. To help with this, all Nikon DSLRs boast a feature called Auto Exposure Bracketing, or AEB. Bracketing essentially involves taking multiple versions of the same image at different exposure settings, to maximise your chances of getting at least one of them spot on – or at least as spot on as you can given the lighting conditions. Here’s how it works: you take a photo as normal, using the settings that you think will give you the best possible exposure, then your Nikon automatically captures one image brighter than your chosen exposure, and another one darker. How much brighter and darker your…

We’ve freshened up our botanical photography with this handy little project to give our shots a completely new perspective. We nestled our Nikon in amongst the ferns in a shaded woodland, and used a wide-angle lens to accentuate the feeling of crawling amongst the leaves. The trick is to get the Nikon as low down as possible and aim it skyward, preferably with the sky shaded by the canopy above. Head out on a sunny day, but aim for a shaded spot away from direct sunlight. Trees provide good cover, but opt for the edge of a forest where it’s brighter as the light falls off the further into a forest you go. In the shade the shadows are soft and flattering; gone are the bright highlights and dark shadows…

The human eye is truly incredible: it can see a massive range of tones from bright highlights to dark shadows. Nikon DSLR image sensors are good, but they can’t quite compete with the human eye when it comes to resolving tonal range. Whenever you try to shoot a high-contrast scene, it’s nearly impossible to capture a single image that retains detail in the shadows and in areas lit by the sunshine. High dynamic range (HDR) images are one way of dealing with this issue. The HDR mode built into most modern Nikon DSLRs can capture and create an HDR image without the need of computer software later. The Nikon takes two exposures – one darker, one brighter – then merges them in-camera into a single JPEG that has an overall…

When something’s too dark, simply pop a trusty flashgun on your Nikon and it becomes well-exposed, right? Well, not always. We hope that the series so far has helped you to feel pretty confident about getting good exposures with your flashgun, which you can use in many instances. But if you’re shooting an object with its own light source, there’s a little more to think about than usual. When photographing subjects that light up themselves, it can be easy to run into all sorts of problems. One of the pitfalls you need to avoid is destroying the light of the subject in favour of brightly exposing the image with flash light. Here we’ll show you how you can balance the ambience and the interest of the subject that’s lit up…

We’ve joined Nikon School UK in the Lake District for a ‘Nikon Meetup’ landscape masterclass. We’re going to show you how to shoot a landscape image with interesting foreground elements. We’ll use these elements to our advantage, enhancing the scene with specific creative compositional techniques, like leading lines and framing. When you arrive at a particularly pleasant vista, avoid the temptation to start shooting straight away. Often the best compositions are found with the eye first, and the camera later. When assessing the scene you should also be aware of how different lenses affect your photo. Wideangle lenses include a wider view of the scene, but they also introduce barrel distortion where the centre of the photo appears to bulge, and straight lines around the edges of the frame bend…

There are many different ways to photograph urban architecture. While some commercial photographers want everything crisp, clean and bright, a fine-art approach might transform the architecture into fluid forms and shapes that are pleasing to the eye. Fine-art urban architecture is simple and pared down. In this project we’ll be showing you how to capture simple yet expressive mono scenes. We’ll be using neutral density filters to help us reach those extended long exposures in daylight and will render the cloud movement silky smooth behind our subjects. These shots work best with the camera pointed directly upwards to make the buildings appear more looming and impressive, and a wide-angle lens perspective accentuates the shapes of the buildings at hand. Modern structures suit this technique thanks to their clean lines, but…

Sometimes, even with lots of preparation in the white balance and colour settings in-camera, your final photo can lack punch. This could come down to a variety of different factors, including lighting conditions, lens flare or innate limitations in the image sensor. It’s handy, then, that you can adjust colour in such a powerful way in Lightroom CC 2018. The Color panel is laid out in an intuitive way that makes it easy for even the beginner to navigate. From the top we see White Balance, Vibrance and Saturation. In Lightroom CC 2018, we also have a redesigned Color Mixer, which makes it easier to selectively adjust the Hue, Saturation and Luminance settings of any individual colour channel as you wish. If you get stuck, Adobe has even thrown in…

Many of Photoshop’s tools are brush-based. By changing the size, softness and opacity of a brush-based tool, you can fine-tune the way it alters the pixels in an image. If you use a graphics tablet then you can use changes in stylus pressure to create lighter or darker strokes and work with more precision. You can also use brushes to mimic natural media. Select the Brush tool, then click the Brush Preset picker and scroll down to find more creative shapes, such as Chalk, which produces a grainy texture. You’ll also find creative brush tips, such as Leaves, which scatters random leaf shapes. By clicking the Brush panel icon you can modify the way a preset shape behaves, such as making the leaves scatter in less dense clumps.To make Photoshop’s…

It’s impossible to learn the art of photography without making a few mistakes along the way, but if you find yourself doing the same things wrong every time you pick up your camera, it’s probably worth getting to the bottom of it. To help you, we’ve come up with 37 common problems that Nikon photographers are likely to encounter, and suggest ways that you can overcome them. Over the next ten pages, you’ll find advice for working out why your shots might be slightly blurred, why they might be darker or brighter than you expected, and why your composition could be letting you down. We’ve also compiled a list of other familiar camera-setting complaints and photography slip-ups that are sure to frustrate you at some point. Whether you’re just starting…