The "Sun", the "Man", or the "Mountain"?

I remember being somewhere with someone, and they had a "point and shoot" (PAS) camera with them.  They wanted to know what was the best setting to capture their photograph.  "Should I use the Sun, the Man, or the Mountain?", they asked.

I had to giggle at the question, but the inquiry was sincere.  Just what do all of those little pictures on the dial mean?  Isn't it just easier to put it on "auto" or "program"?


Let's explore!  Using the above dial as a universal reference, let's start with the flash setting (the one on the bottom of the dial that looks like a lightning bolt arrow with a "no" slash through it).
Generally, PAS cameras will have 3 flash settings:
1.  Flash
2.  No flash
3.  Red Eye Reduction
Personally, I nearly always use a flash on the PAS cameras, even outdoors.  The little flashes on those cameras do a good job of filling in shadows in sunlight.


Remember that red-eye reduction mode will send out several pre-flash flashes which can cause children and animals to flinch or close their eyes.


Okay, let's move onto the "man with a star behind his shoulder".  Generally, this is a slow shutter speed that also uses flash.  This is a night-time setting which allows you to use a flash to light up your main subject, but keeps the shutter open to grab the background lights.  For example:

You will want to use a tripod for this one.  In the above picture, I wanted to capture the muti-colored laser patterns that were on the ceiling.  They would not show up with simple bounced flash, and it was too dark in there for simply using no flash at all.


The next setting we'll discuss is the "running man".  This is your "action" setting.  Even though PAS cameras pretty much do everything for you, they also need to know WHAT it is you're shooting.  If you read my last blog, you will know that you can get the same exposure in several different ways.  You can have a fast shutter speed and wide aperture, or a slow shutter speed with a small aperture.  Both will give you the same exposure, but the results will look different.
For action, we want the fast shutter speed.  This setting lets the camera know that you are more concerned with a fast shutter speed, and sets itself accordingly.

The "flower" setting tells the camera that you're trying to take a closeup of something, and adjust its focus for closer-up items:

The "mountain" setting tells the camera that you're taking a landscape photo, and it adjusts itself to focus on a far-away object, while maintaining some depth-of-field:

And finally, the "profile of a woman" setting tells the camera that you're taking a portrait.  This allows the camera to use a very wide aperture to blur the background so the subject in the portait is the emphasis:

You can get more from your little PAS camera if you let it work for you!  =)