Camera settings when using Aperture

I suggest the following as a conceptual framework.

Cameras today do two things that are best thought of as distinct families of operatons. They _record data_, and they _make pictures_.

I use my camera as a data recorder. I then upload the data to my computer, and use Aperture (and other software programs) to make pictures from the data I recorded. The camera saves this data in RAW files.

As an almost universally applicable rule, computers do a better job making pictures than cameras do. (Personally, I would like to see this distinction made real: I don't want to pay for camera bodies that do any more computing than data recording and display requires. How many Sony cameras -- just to pick on the brand I use -- have ever been used to show slideshows on Bravia TVs?)

The settings that are important for data recording are (as you listed) those for _exposure_: duration (stupidly known as "shutter speed"), aperture (I suggest "hole size"), and (as I understand it) signal amplification (stupidly known as ISO). Everything else (including White Balance) are, literally, post-processing operations. ("Post-processing" is, afaik, a short form of "Post-exposure processing".) The other exposure settings are important, but not usually thought of as settings: focal length, focus distance, location and direction of camera.

The above is for RAW data recording. JPG is not a light data format, it is an image format. As such, JPG requires post-processing. For me, JPG is a quick-and-dirty, proofing format. It has its uses. I almost never use it.

Keith Barkley wrote:

Does Apple provide any advice on this?

Not that I know of. Apple prefers to flood valleys and let users figure out where to build their vacation homes and how to not crash their boats on submerged rocks. They have mastered the art of presenting appealing vacation-lands. Part of that is _not_ listing rules for use beyond the most general, and certainly not letting users know how cold it gets at night or that scorpions can nest in your slippers. Specifically, they remove any odor of engineering from every product they sell. The advice you are asking for is good, useful, and ... (broadly) engineering. Apple prefers (imho) to have its users provide that to those who seek it, so that those who don't seek it won't be discouraged from buying the vacation package 😉 .

--Kirby.

The advice seems fine, it's what I do when I shoot raw. As only those settings affect the Raw image there is really no sense in fooling with the others.

I for one am glad Aperture ignores all the other camera settings when I shoot raw. If I wanted the image in Aperture to look like the camera generated JPG I'd shoot JPG.

regards

"ISO" is the name of the organization that creates and promotes the use of standards. (ISO publishes over 19,500 standards.) Using "ISO" for the name of a single, very specific set of rules defining a standard is stupid, imho. Nikon, at least, refers to this as "ISO Sensitivity". "Sensitivity" is what is being quantified. "ISO" is the standard used to quantify it.

Exposure is determined by the amount of time the sensor is exposed to light, the size of the hole through which the light passes, and the sensitivity of the sensor.

Message was edited by: Kirby Krieger - added link.

If I wanted the image in Aperture to look like the camera generated JPG I'd shoot JPG.

And I sometimes shoot JPG, i.e. when I am using my LUmix that is still not supported by Aperture.

I give the advice that it is best to only set ISO, aperture and shutter speed on the camera when shooting RAW

Only, it is not easy to tell, what most of the "Program" settings in a camera will do. Nearly all program settings in my Lumix are just clever combinations of IOS, shutter speed, and aperture, and when I use them, the dng will look exactly light the JPG. There are only very few "creative" setting, that will adjust the color, for example "sunset" will exagerate the red, and if I want to try them, I shoot raw&jpeg, to have the jpeg as an example.

Veering OT here ...

I'm already ANSI enough 👿 . Inheritance has never been shown to elevate stupidity. My issue here is based on teaching. Cameras are not conceptually complex, but the nomenclature used might as well have been designed by Freemasons trying to mystify the sacred eye box (or manufacturers trying to sell "auto" solutions to easy problems).

I propose that one of the single best ways to improve photography world-wide is to replace the terms

• "f/stop",
• "shutter speed", and
• "ISO"

with

• "{relative} hole size",
• "{exposure} duration", and
• "{sensor} sensitivity".

I don't know of anywhere that Aperture provides specific guidance on this.

But in general RAW can be re-interpreted later. That's one of the benefits of it.

I do set white balance in the camera at times. I seem to recall that Aperture will pick up that setting.

Also, do note that the camera settings do affect the embedded JPEG previews in files, and will affect what you see on the back of the camera for previews. This can be useful when you're out shooting, and if you're intending to make a black & white photo, it can be VERY useful, even if Aperture is going to generate a color version from the RAW file when it imports it.

But it is true that setting the color space in the photos to Adobe RGB will not expand dynamic range like it would for a JPEG, and things like "vivid" or "landscape" or "portrait" are largely a waste of time.

Ah, yes, I forgot about those. Definitely avoid those settings because they mess with Aperture and Lightroom's conversions.

Keith Barkley wrote:

I should have pointed out that what you really want to do is avoid things like "Highlight priority" (Canon) and "Active D-Lighting" (Nikon?) which actually affect the raw data.

To my knowledge Active D-Lighting changes the overall exposure. It underexposes the image by a certain degree (1/3 rd stops or more) and then pulls up the shadows in the JPEG engine. This results in more image noise in the shadow areas of an image. Capture NX interprets this setting and also pulls up the shadows in post processing, but any non-Nikon RAW converter does not. You can shoot with ADL on, but you'll have to manually pull up the shadows in Aperture, too, to get a similar result.

But I would not recomment it because it's the opposite of another valid method to improve image quality while shooting RAW, "Expose to the right".

You can find some detailed articles on ETTR on Luminous Landscape:

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/expose-right.shtml

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/optimizing_exposure.shtml

It seems to me that telling them to reset the camera to the defaults, and taking some test shots with only the Big Three, might help to resolve the problem.

Please write a User Tip about the Big Three, Keith. That one would be really useful; we just could link to it and avoid having to give the same answer over and over again.