jcrow! jcrow! i need your help with the canon sd630!

[cutes814]

hey jcrow! i need your help and advice cheeks!

i know we have the same camera. the canon sd630. i''m always drooling over your pictures, but for some reason, my camera does not do that! i have no idea how to work it. my pictures turn out pretty crappy.

i''m using the digital macro setting, pressing the camera button half way until it focuses on the diamond, but i can never get clear crisp photos like yours. whenever i try to get close to the stone and focus the pic, it wouldn''t allow me.

am i missing something? maybe i have to redo my settings? i''ve been trying to play around with it for the past hour and nothing! the pics are still the same. mediocre...

can you walk me thru on how to program it to take better pics of my baubles?

i would love to be able to capture the pics really close to the stone and to have it appear crisp and clear. am i making sense?

 

[October2008bride]

I''m not Jcrow, but I have the SD630 as well.

Are you using the zoom? Beacuse if you are, that might be a problem.

What I do is use the digital macro (the one you get to by clicking on menu (if I recall)). Then I set up the ring in either a well lit room if it is a hand pic, or by a window with the sun coming in from behind the stone if its not on my finger.

I guess I usually have the camera about 5 inches or so away from the ering, but sometimes farther.

Make sure your hand is steady (I like to rest my hands on something solid as opposed to trying to steady them in the air), and do what you are doing - pressing down halfway until it focuses and then clicking the shutter all the way.

If it isn''t focusing when you go halfway after those instructions, try moving the camera a bit farther away.

Hope that helps!

 

[cutes814]

thanks for the response octbride.

that''s exactly what i''m doing and i''m unable to produce the really up close shots that i want.

i don''t have my zoom on and everything you said is exactly what i''m doing.

i want some pictures that are so close to the diamond you can see the interior facets and brilliance of the stone. lemme see if i can dig up one of jcrow''s photos to show what i mean.

 

[cutes814]

like this one

 

[cutes814]

or this

 

[cutes814]

and this

 

[cutes814]

does anyone have the canon sd630 and know how to achieve photos like jcrow''s?

or maybe you have a different canon and know how to do it? please help!

 

[October2008bride]

Milly are they clear when you take them a bit farther away? Because with the camera having such high mega pixels, you could reasonably take a picture farther away and crop and have it still be clear - I think Jcrow may be doing that too.

 

[October2008bride]

I tried to do an example. Here is a picture that all I did was resize so I could post it.

 

[October2008bride]

And here I''ve just cropped it.

Same pic.

 

[October2008bride]

Anyways - maybe someone else will have better ideas, but that is my 2 cents! Hope it helps a little!

 

[cutes814]

you are definitely helping!

i feel like such a dork now. i have never thought to crop my photos??

omg, dork!

maybe that is the problem.

i''m always wondering how in the world do people take all these up close shots???

i think i''ll be having a photo session tonight. thanks for your help octoberbride!

 

[jcrow]

omg. sorry i''ve been MIA. let me re-read and see if i can help

 

[jcrow]

ok, i know for sure that the last two pics of mine you posted as examples are NOT cropped. the first one maybe, but probably not.

the first pic - the blueish one - i used the tungston (sp??) setting. i was in the living room and had a spot light behind the stone. the ring is on a pile of books & the blue cloth is the WF cleaning cloth. i put the camera right in front of the ring and rested it on a pile of books as well so that i could tame the shakes. the camera was set on macro/no flash/no zoom and i took a ton of pics before getting sharp ones.

the last pic was taken outside, no extra light.

one thing i did was when about to take the pic, i would look for the black arrows. that''s how i knew it''s lined up correctly.

hopefully some of this helps?

 

[jcrow]

oh oh, and also... i doubt this is the case, but i must add that i did have to bring my camera in for fixing recently. the macro wasn''t focusing anymore. but this was very obvious so i''m sure you''d know if it wasn''t working. for me it just wasn''t becoming clear after i held down the button (before the shot actually takes).