By DAVID POGUE in the NY Times
>>RECENTLY, I was lying next to a hotel pool, keeping an eye on the children, when the guy on the next chaise swore like a sailor.
He was peering at his little digital camera, looking furious. I couldn't help myself. "Do you need help with that?" I asked.
"This is the stupidest camera," he said. "I've tried three times to take a picture of my son going off the diving board, but the delay is so bad, I miss it every time."
I knew he was talking about shutter lag, the maddening time it takes for most digital cameras to focus and calculate the exposure after you have squeezed the shutter button but before the shot is captured.
I nodded sympathetically. "And even the half-pressing trick doesn't work, eh?"
He looked at me as though I had just spoken Aramaic. "The what?"
Suddenly it dawned on me that this guy didn't know the half-pressing trick. He didn't realize that you can usually eliminate the shutter lag by half-pressing the shutter button before the action begins. The camera prefocuses, precalculates and locks in those settings as long as you continue to half-press. Then, when the child finally leaves the diving board, you press the rest of the way down to capture the shot. No lag - no lie.
The guy was so happy, he bought me a ginger ale.
End shutter lag. If your camera has a shutter-lag problem, the prefocusing trick may be your best bet. Another option: many cameras offer a continuous-focus option that eats up your battery faster but also reduces shutter lag by focusing constantly as you aim the camera (or as the subject moves).
Newer and more expensive cameras tend to have the least shutter lag, and digital single-lens reflex, or S.L.R., models (the big, heavy, $900-ish cameras that take interchangeable lenses) have none at all.<<
All this is probably explained in the camera's manual, so another good piece of advice for your student is to READ the manual. :-)
Though all this prefocusing might in vain if you are shooting a macro shot and have a busy background - the camera sometimes doesn't really know what to do. Then you have to switch to manual focusing.
Renate
and here is his answer to this problem:
>>
On 6/15/05, Marilyn <marilyn@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Digital question:
I have a question from students I am unable to answer, so I am bringing it
to the experts.
A student who owns two digital cameras says when he pushes the shutter
release it takes the camera seconds to respond and he sometimes misses the
shot (I think I read something about this on PF). Does something need
setting on the camera? Is this normal for a digital camera? One of his
cameras is a Kodak, I forgot what the other is.
Thank you in advance.
Marilyn
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Leave gentle fingerprints on the
soul of another for the angels to read.
Proverb
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