Swinging through autumn, why nat pause for a moment to total up your season's picture-score, before you dive into the fun of this winter's picture-taking?
Take your recent prints, figure out your "batting average, determine most frequent mistakes—and you will be better able to avoid those errors in the future.
How many times were you "struck out" by underexposure? Bring out those underexposed films, and study them, Are they mostly early-morning or late-afternoon shots? If so, you should watch the sun more carefully. When it is near the horizon, and begins to take on a yellow tinge, its light is much weaker—and you should compensate by using a wider lens opening, or a slower shutter speed.
Did you underexpose on cloudy days? Light is weaker then. The latitude of modern films will take care of reasonable errors in exposure, but on a dull day it's always safe to open up the lens to the next larger matk—163 instead of £8, for example.
If you under-exposed on bright sunny days, when the light was at its best, you were simply using too small à lens opening for, your shutter speed. An inexpensive pocket exposure guide will help protect you from such errors—get one, and use it on every camera excursion. They cost but little—and some are given away free, How about blurred pictures, from subject movement or camera unsteadiness? Here's an easy cure. Just use a higher shutter speed. If your customary exposure is 1/25 second at f.11, try using 1/50 second at LB or even 1/100 second at £63. And another point: when you press the shutter release, don't jerk. Hold the camera firmly, push the release easily. Pretend you're firing a rifle at the distant target, and the shutter release lever i6 the trigger.
Are your pictures framed correctly? Do they show what you expected? If mot, watch that view-finder! It gives you a "preview" of the picture, Is focusing correct, details sharply defined? If not, practice judging distance, so you can set the carbora scale correctly—and try using a tape measure or rangefinder for close-ups, A picture inventory is good camera training. Check your summer snaps—note down your "weak spots"—and you're better set for a successful winter snapshot season.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.