Taking a picture for the newspaper..

[Conor D]

I've had my DSLR for a few weeks.. And already someones looking to put my stuff in the paper!

(okay, so not really..) Someone's retiring from my Mum's company, and they're putting their picture in a couple of papers along with a short paragraph.. Yesterday the people from the paper rang to say that they wouldn't be able to take the picture. So my Mum's asked me to come and take it..

I haven't had my DSLR for long enough to be totally familar with all the settings.. I've never really used flash for example, and when using it I normally just mess around with the settings to find something good, at my own leisure.

I have to go take the picture at half 5.. and I dont really want to be standing around trying to find some good settings.. Does anyone have any advice on where to start? Chances are it'll be a small group of people either standing outside, or inside a building..

Or should I just whack it into auto and snap a few with the flash on, and a few with the flash off? I suppose it's not that big of a deal, I just dont want them to turn out st.

[GetCarter]

As it's light at that time, take it outside, position them a good distance in front of a building/something relevant, make sure the sun is not behind you (squinting!) or behind the subject (camera freak out), and leave it on auto, and you'll be fine. Forget flash.

(Taking them away from the background will help the camera sort out decent depth of field - i.e. make the people stand out from their surroundings).

There are MANY better ways to take photos, but this will work!

Good luck.

Edited by GetCarter on Wednesday 26th May 16:00