Julie Adair King has been covering digital cameras and photography for over a decade. Along with the perennially popular Digital Photography For Dummies, she has written For Dummies guides on a wide variety of Canon and Nikon dSLR cameras. She also teaches at the Palm Beach Photographic Centre.

Introduction 1

A Quick Look at What's Ahead 1

Icons and Other Stuff to Note 2

eCheat Sheet 3

Practice, Be Patient, and Have Fun! 3

Part I: Fast Track to Super Snaps 5

Chapter 1: Getting the Lay of the Land 7

Looking at Lenses 7

Choosing a lens 8

Attaching and removing a lens 11

Zooming in and out 12

Using an IS (image stabilizer) lens 13

Getting acquainted with focusing 14

Adjusting the Viewfinder 15

Adjusting the Monitor Position 16

Using the Touchscreen 17

Working with Memory Cards 20

Exploring External Camera Features 22

Topside controls 22

Back-of-the-body controls 24

Front odds and ends 27

Connection ports 28

Ordering from Camera Menus 30

Navigating the Custom Functions Menu 32

Monitoring Critical Camera Settings 34

The Info button: Choosing what the screen shows 34

Checking the Camera Settings display 35

Viewing the Shooting Settings display 36

Decoding viewfinder data 38

Reading the LCD panel 40

Changing Settings via the Quick Control Screen 40

Getting Help from Your Camera 42

Reviewing Basic Setup Options 42

Cruising the Setup menus 43

Setting up the Lock switch 49

Taking two final setup steps 50

Chapter 2: Choosing Basic Picture Settings 51

Choosing an Exposure Mode 52

Changing the Drive Mode 54

Getting Familiar with the Built-in Flash 56

Using flash in the fully automatic modes 57

Enabling flash in advanced exposure modes 59

Using Red-Eye Reduction flash 60

Controlling Picture Quality 60

Diagnosing quality problems 61

Decoding the Image Quality options 63

Considering Resolution: Large, Medium, or Small? 65

Understanding File Type (JPEG or Raw) 68

JPEG: The imaging (and web) standard 68

Raw (CR2): The purist's choice 70

My take: Choose Fine or Raw 72

Chapter 3: Taking Great Pictures, Automatically 73

As Easy As It Gets: Auto and Flash Off 74

Taking Advantage of Scene (SCN) Modes 77

Modifying scene mode results 88

Gaining More Control with Creative Auto 94

Chapter 4: Exploring Live View Shooting and Movie Making 99

Getting Started 100

Reviewing Live View and Movie mode cautions 102

Customizing the display 103

Focusing in Live View and Movie Modes 106

Disabling continuous autofocusing 106

Choosing an AF (autofocus) mode 109

Manual focusing 118

Zooming in for a focus check 118

Exploring Other Live View Options 119

Setting the photo aspect ratio 120

Adjusting other Live View picture settings 120

Using the touch shutter 127

Recording Your First Movie 128

Customizing Movie Recording Settings 131

Movie Menu 1 133

Movie Menu 2 134

Using Movie Digital Zoom 139

Snapping a Photo During Recording 140

Playing Movies 141

Part II: Working with Picture Files 145

Chapter 5: Picture Playback 147

Disabling and Adjusting Image Review 147

Exploring Playback Mode 148

Switching to Index (thumbnails) view 149

Using the Quick Control screen during playback 150

Jumping through images 151

Rotating pictures 154

Zooming in for a closer view 156

Viewing Picture Data 157

Basic Information display data 159

Shooting Information display mode 160

Understanding Histogram display mode 162

Enabling a few display extras 165

Deleting Photos 166

Erasing single images 166

Erasing all images on the memory card 167

Erasing selected images 167

Protecting Photos 169

Protecting (or unprotecting) a single photo 169

Protecting multiple photos 170

Rating Photos 172

Viewing Your Photos on a Television 174

Chapter 6: Downloading, Printing, and Sharing Your Photos 177

Installing the Canon Software 178

Sending Pictures to the Computer 180

Connecting camera and computer via USB 180

Connecting to the computer via Wi-Fi 181

Downloading from the camera 185

Downloading from a card reader 187

Processing Raw (CR2) Files 189

Processing Raw images in the camera 189

Converting Raw images in Digital Photo Professional 192

Planning for Perfect Prints 196

Check the pixel count before you print 196

Allow for different print proportions 198

Calibrate your monitor 200

Preparing Pictures for Online Sharing 201

Part III: Taking Creative Control 205

Chapter 7: Getting Creative with Exposure 207

Kicking Your Camera into High Gear 207

Introducing Exposure Basics: Aperture, Shutter Speed, and ISO 209

Understanding exposure-setting side effects 211

Doing the exposure balancing act 215

Monitoring Exposure Settings 216

Choosing an Exposure Metering Mode 219

Setting ISO, f-stop, and Shutter Speed 222

Controlling ISO 222

Adjusting aperture and shutter speed 225

Sorting through Your Camera's Exposure-Correction Tools 227

Overriding autoexposure results with Exposure Compensation 227

Improving high-contrast shots 231

Experimenting with Auto Lighting Optimizer 236

Correcting vignetting with Peripheral Illumination Correction 239

Dampening noise 242

Locking Autoexposure Settings 244

Bracketing Exposures Automatically 246

Setting up for automatic bracketing 247

Shooting a bracketed series 250

Using Flash in Advanced Exposure Modes 250

Understanding your camera's approach to flash 251

Using flash outdoors 255

Adjusting flash power with Flash

Exposure Compensation 256

Locking the flash exposure 259

Exploring more flash options 260

Chapter 8: Manipulating Focus and Color 265

Reviewing Focus Basics 265

Introducing the AF-ON button 267

Adjusting Autofocus Performance 268

AF Area mode: One focus point or many? 269

Changing the AF (autofocus) mode 271

Choosing the right autofocus combo 273

Manipulating Depth of Field 274

Controlling Color 279

Correcting colors with white balance 279

Changing the White Balance setting 281

Creating a custom White Balance setting 283

Fine-tuning White Balance settings 285

Bracketing shots with white balance 288

Taking a Quick Look at Picture Styles 293

Chapter 9: Putting It All Together 299

Recapping Basic Picture Settings 299

Setting Up for Specifi c Scenes 302

Shooting still portraits 302

Capturing action 307

Capturing scenic vistas 311

Capturing dynamic close-ups 314

Part IV: The Part of Tens 317

Chapter 10: Ten Features to Explore on a Rainy Day 319

Enabling Mirror Lockup Shooting 320

Adding Cleaning Instructions to Images 320

Tagging Files with Your Copyright Claim 321

Exploring Wi-Fi Functions 322

Experimenting with Creative Filters 324

Shooting in Multiple Exposure Mode 328

Investigating Two More Printing Options 329

Presenting a Slide Show 329

Editing Movies 330

Creating Video Snapshots 331

Chapter 11: Ten More Ways to Customize Your Camera 333

Creating Your Own Exposure Mode 333

Creating Your Very Own Camera Menu 335

Creating Custom Folders 337

Changing the Color Space from sRGB to Adobe RGB 338

Changing the Direction of the Dials 339

Changing All the Furniture Around 339

Disabling the AF-Assist Beam 341

Controlling the Lens Focus Drive 342

Making the Flashing Red AF Points Go Away 343

Considering a Few Other Autofocusing Tweaks 343

Appendix: Glossary of Digital Photography Terms 347

Index 359