I need help.. (new lens, bad photos)

melissa6631

This is a new 75-300mm tamron lens for my 300D.
I KNOW it's not the lens and I know it's me but I'm trying to learn the basics with this camera before my tucson trip on Sunday.

Here are some pictures I took and I'm just not sure what I'm doing wrong.







Here is the gallery where i've uploaded the full sizes.. .
http://goooz.smugmug.com/gallery/571895/1/23886426

dragon300zx

The kids cute as can be, the focus seems good to me on the monitor here at work. Seems to me though that your exposures seem alittle off. It would be easier for us to help if when know what you don't like about the photos. 1 and 2 seems a tad dark to me which is under exposure, 3 seems maybe a tad bright, possibly blown out areas? which is over exposure. Are you shooting in raw mode?

Edit.

One thing in looking at your originals that I noticed is some of them like number 1 in this forum maybe a bit soft. Looking at yoru EXIF data you shot it at a focal length of about 109mm (170mm equivalent on 35mm camera) according your EXIF but your shutter speed was 1/60 of a second (it was dark indoors it looked like and a slow shutter speed was needed) when hand holding a camera and shooting you want to make sure your shutter speed is the same as or longer than your focal length. Otherwise you will get blur or other focus problems.

wxwax

The first two have camera blur. The exposure's 1/60 and your focal length is about three times greater. Basically, the flash wasn't strong enough to overcome the focal length. What lens were you using?

On the outdoor shots, once you stopped down to f10 the exposure was right. In what mode was your camera when you took these shots?

Mongrel

Hi Melissa! Great to see you here....
I totally agree with Dragon and Sid-seems like shutter speed would be your main culpret here. 1/60 is way slow for hand holding at those focal lengths. It takes extraordinary skill to hand hold like that (I certainly can't do it...).

Also, as Sid asked, what mode was your Rebel in? Are you shooting in the 'creative zone' or the pre-programmed modes? The Rebel doesn't factor in your focal length and adjust your shutter speed accordingly, so if you are say in the Portrait mode and shooting at 170mm it just may give you a 1/60 shutter speed.

In the shots that are *on* the lens itself looks fine-sharp, good color, etc. so that isn't your problem in my opinion.

Let us know the answers to the above and we will help you narrow it down.

(BTW-How in the world were you shooting a Digital Rebel in 1980?!!!!

You camera date must be set wrong it says those shots were taken on 1-01-1980 )

Again great to *see* you here,

Mongrel