How To Take Multiple Shots In A Self-Timer Mode?

This post is a part of our Q&A section. If you want to submit your question, please use the form in the Contact page.

Shyam (Delhi, India) asked : I have set my camera settings to take multiple shots in a self timer mode, but when the pictures is taken, it takes only one shot. What am I doing wrong here?

Hi Shyam! First of all, I found your question little bit incomplete. You didn't mention what are the settings you have adjusted on the camera and under what lighting condition you are taking pictures. Sometimes, even if your camera settings are right, because of the available lights or not enough time to recycle the flash power or many other variables, you may not get the result you want. If you are shooting in a bright daylight, all you have to do is make sure that the camera is set to continuous (burst) shooting mode and the focus is being tracked and locked if the subject is moving. If you are shooting in a dark night and using an external flash unit, you might have to check couple of other settings as well, which I will describe bit later in this blog. First, lets review the setup steps that need to be done on the camera to take multiple shots in a self-timer mode.

Camera Settings for a Self-Timer Mode

In this blog, I am taking the reference of Nikon D90, but I believe these camera settings are same for almost every other Nikon DSLR camera. It is possible that you might find the buttons and the menu options in different places, but once you get the idea, it won’t be hard to adjust the settings no matter which camera brand and model you use.

Now, lets get into the setup menu.

1. Press the Menu button on the back of the camera and go to CSM (Custom Setting Menu).

2. Use the multi-selector button and go to c Timers/AE lock menu.

3. Go to the option c3 and select Self-timer, and you will see two options inside.

Nikon D90 Self-Timer Mode Menu

4. First option, Self-timer delay, allows you to set the time after how many seconds camera should start taking the pictures, and the available values are 2s, 5s, 10s, 20s.

4. And the next option is Number of shots you want to take in a self-timer mode. You can choose between 1 and 9 shots.

Nikon D90 Self-Timer Mode

5. Optionally, you can also select CL (Continuous Low) mode shooting speed (1fps, 2fps, 3fps and 4fps) into CSM->Shooting/display->d6 (CL mode shooting speed).

6. Finally, you have to change the shooting mode into self-timer mode (with burst shooting). You can do so my pressing the button on the top (shown in the picture) and rotating the main command dial while the button is still being pressed. When you see the burst mode with the clock (self-timer) icon displayed on the LCD screen, you can let go the button and you are all set.

If you have already done all of these setup on the camera and still not getting multiple shots in a self-timer mode, it is time to check your camera's Autofocus Mode. When you are shooting in a burst mode, you probably want to use AF-C or AF-A autofocus mode. And if you are shooting in a dark night with an external flash on, you may not get multiple shots because of the flash recycle time. Once you take a shot, flash may take a few seconds to recycle itself and get ready for the next shot. Also, if you are shooting with a higher frame rate, 4fps for example, its hard to achieve that shooting speed with an external flash unit attached on the camera.

I hope I was able to answer your question, and if you have a follow up question or more questions, please write back to me. Happy shooting!

Is Post Processing Necessary In Digital Photography?

This post is a part of our Q&A section. If you want to submit your question, please use the form in the Contact page.

Afrina (Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia) asked : I am not a pro photographer but I enjoy photography. When I visit the flickr and other photographers' website or blog, they have a collection of amazing photographs. Some of the photographers also revel what editing tool they used and what was done on the picture during post-processing. Do you think it is necessary to use any software to make your photograph look good?

I have seen this confusion on many photographers from different level of expertise. I think this wouldn’t be that much of interesting topic when you are just starting photography but as you progress more on your composition skill and master your camera settings, the next stop would be the editing skill. I also went through the same situation a while ago and started looking my option for post-processing. When it comes to the editing, different photographers have different views about the process and the tools they would like to use. Even after reading many blogs and online tips, the answer was not so clear to me whether the editing skill is a must to have to enhance your photography or it is just an optional choice. Some of my friends jokingly say that, if you are using Photoshop to enhance your photographs then it's not a photography, it is a Photoshopgraphy. I find it funny but meaningful statement at the same time. When I see other photographers’ work, I forget all the critics and feel like editing is a must have skill set and is one of the important part of digital photography. After doing much research, I wrote a blog about post processing where I discussed more about the post-processing and listed down some of the best known post-processing software in the market.

To be honest, it is not always necessary to use a software and process the pictures but sometimes you find it necessary just to tweak some settings, adjust colors and lights or even crop the sides. Some people think cropping is not really a post processing but I would say, if you use any software to manipulate the photographs by any means, it is a post-processing because you processed the photographs after taking it out from the camera.

Let me present you an example of a photograph, before and after processing it, and you shall decide if post-processing is really necessary or not. And also, as always, I welcome your comments as well.

Before post processing

I took this photograph of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool last year. When I came home and downloaded the picture from the camera, I felt good about it's composition (symmetry) but felt like I was missing something on the picture. I was not really happy with the color contrast and thought of playing with the color tones and the contrast and see how will it become. I started editing the picture using Capture NX2, one of my favorite software to process RAW images. During the processing of the image, I increased the color contrast and adjusted the brightness of the picture which transformed the picture into the next level. Just a couple of small tweaks boosted the mood of the image and the result was very impressive. The picture looked more vibrant and lively after the post-processing.

After post processing

The result is in front of you and I let you decide whether the post processing is really necessary in digital photography or not. But looking at the transformation this image got, I think you would agree that post-processing is an essential tool and may greatly help you to enhance the picture if done correctly. You just have to be careful about not doing it too much, otherwise it may not look natural.

How To Tell My Camera To Focus On Particular Area?

This post is a part of our Q&A section. If you want to submit your question, please use the form in the Contact page.

Lita (Manila, Philippines) asked :  When I am taking pictures of wildlife, I use Autofocus (AF) most of the time for obvious reasons. And most of the time when I try to frame and focus the animal, trees and branches get focused instead of the main subject. How can I force my Nikon D90 to focus on particular area?

Lita, if you do not want camera taking the control of the focus, short and quick answer is to manually focus the subject. When you manually focus using the focusing ring on the lens barrel, you can select the area to be in focus whether it would be in the middle of the frame or at any other focus point. But we all know that focusing manually is not a practical solution specially when you are shooting wildlife and that is the reason our DSLRs come with the autofocus option to quickly focus your subject. And autofocus works perfectly in most of the situations but sometimes you may encounter the problem you have described in your question. When you are using the Manual Focus mode, you can take over the control of the focusing system but the good news is that, your camera Nikon D90, may have a solution for the AF users as well.

When you are shooting in Autofocus mode and want to take the control of the focusing system, you need to change the Autofocus option inside the Custom Setting Menu (CSM). By default, Nikon D90 selects the focus point automatically based on the information it gets through the lens and that was the reason, sometimes, you were encountering the focusing issue. And the reason is, your camera can not differentiate between the subject and the object inside the frame. To change that default setting, press the MENU button on the back of your camera and go to the CSM menu (Pencil Icon). Then choose the first option (a Autofocus) and select the Single Point. When you select the autofocus point to a single point, you can now select the focus point by using the Thumb Pad (Multi-selector button) on the back of your camera and lock the focus point wherever you want by using the AF Selector Lock lever next to the LCD screen. This guarantees that the camera is focusing on your intended subject because you've told it in advance which of the 11 AF points to use for the focusing.

Note: If you want to lock the focus point into one spot, please make sure that the lever next to the LCD screen is switched to the L (Locked) position after you select the preferred focus point, otherwise, you might inadvertently select a different AF point by bumping into the thumb pad. The lock switch was designed to prevent such accidental change of the focus point and works really well. Your camera locks the focal point in L position of the lever switch and allows you to change focus point when the lever is set to the Unlocked (Single DOT) position.