Category: Technology

A common problem when taking pictures of people outside, especially during the midday hours, is that the overhead sun can create dark shadows under the eyes and chin. You could have your subject turn his or her face to the sun, but that is usually considered cruel and unusual punishment. So how can you have…

Face detection is becoming commonplace in digital cameras. Your D7000 has four autofocus modes for Live View: Wide Area, Normal Area, Subject Tracking, and Face Priority. These modes are different from the standard modes like AF-S, AF-C, and AF-A. Face Priority mode is probably the slowest of the Live View focusing modes, so use it…

As long as we are talking about picture controls for portraits, there is another control on your D7000 that has been tuned specifically for this type of shooting. Oddly enough, it’s called Portrait. To set this control on your camera, simply follow the same directions as earlier, except this time, select the Portrait control (PT)…

There is something timeless about a black-and-white portrait. It eliminates the distraction of color and puts all the emphasis on the subject. To get great black-andwhites without having to resort to any image-processing software, set your picture control to Monochrome (Figure 6.10). The picture controls are automatically applied when shooting with the JPEG file format.…

It has been said that the eyes are the windows to the soul, and nothing could be truer when you are photographing someone (Figure 6.9). You could have the perfect composition and exposure, but if the eyes aren’t sharp the entire image suffers. While there are many focusing modes to choose from on your D7000…

There will often be times when your subject is not in the center of the frame but you still want to use the Center-weighted Metering mode. So how can you get an accurate reading if the subject isn’t in the center? Try using the Auto Exposure Lock feature to hold the exposure setting while you…

For most portrait situations, the Matrix Metering mode is ideal. (For more on how metering works, see the “Metering Basics” sidebar.) This mode measures light values from all portions of the viewfinder and then establishes a proper exposure for the scene. The only problem that you might encounter when using this metering mode is when…

If you took a poll of portrait photographers to see which shooting mode was most often used for portraits, the answer would certainly be Aperture Priority (A, for short) mode. Selecting the right aperture is important for placing the most critically sharp area of the photo on your subject while simultaneously blurring all of the…

Before we get to the assignments for this chapter, I thought it might be a good idea to leave you with a few extra pointers on shooting portraits that don’t necessarily have anything specific to do with your camera. There are entire books that cover things like portrait lighting, posing, and so on. But here…

A common problem when taking pictures of people outside, especially during the midday hours, is that the overhead sun can create dark shadows under the eyes and chin. You could have your subject turn his or her face to the sun, but that’s usually considered cruel and unusual punishment. So how can you have your…