Nikon® D7100™ by Julie Adair King Nikon® D7100™ For Dummies® Published by: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030-5774, www.wiley.com Copyright © 2013 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey Published simultaneously in Canada No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise, except as permit- ted under Sections 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without the prior written permis- sion of the Publisher. Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, (201) 748-6011, fax (201) 748- 6008, or online at http://www.wiley.com/go/permissions. 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Library of Congress Control Number: 2013937650 ISBN 978-1-118-53046-7 (pbk); ISBN 978-1-118-53040-5 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-118-53049-8 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-118-53055-9 (ebk) Manufactured in the United States of America 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Contents at a Glance Introduction ................................................................ 1 Part I: Fast Track to Super Snaps .................................. 5 Chapter 1: Getting the Lay of the Land ...........................................................................7 Chapter 2: Choosing Basic Picture Settings .................................................................45 Chapter 3: Taking Great Pictures, Automatically ........................................................79 Chapter 4: Exploring Live View Photography and Movie Making .............................93 Part II: Working with Picture Files ............................ 127 Chapter 5: Playback Mode: Viewing, Erasing, and Protecting Photos ....................129 Chapter 6: Downloading, Printing, and Sharing Your Photos ..................................161 Part III: Taking Creative Control ............................... 191 Chapter 7: Getting Creative with Exposure and Lighting .........................................193 Chapter 8: Manipulating Focus and Color ..................................................................249 Chapter 9: Putting It All Together ................................................................................291 Part IV: The Part of Tens .......................................... 307 Chapter 10: Ten Fun (And Practical) Ways to Manipulate Your Photos ................309 Chapter 11: Ten More Ways to Customize Your Camera .........................................337 Index ...................................................................... 357 Table of Contents Introduction ................................................................. 1 A Quick Look at What’s Ahead ......................................................................1 Icons and Other Stuff to Note ........................................................................2 eCheat Sheet .....................................................................................................3 Practice, Be Patient, and Have Fun! ...............................................................3 Part I: Fast Track to Super Snaps ................................... 5 Chapter 1: Getting the Lay of the Land . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Looking at Lenses ............................................................................................7 Choosing a lens ......................................................................................8 Attaching and removing lenses ..........................................................11 Changing the focusing method (auto or manual) ............................13 Zooming in and out ..............................................................................13 Getting shake-free shots with Vibration Reduction (VR) lenses ........14 Adjusting the Viewfinder Focus ...................................................................16 Ordering from Camera Menus .....................................................................17 Decoding the Displays ..................................................................................20 Working with Memory Cards .......................................................................22 Using two cards at the same time ......................................................24 Formatting cards ..................................................................................25 Exploring External Camera Controls ...........................................................26 Topside controls ..................................................................................26 Back-of-the-body controls ...................................................................28 Front-left controls ................................................................................31 Front-right controls .............................................................................32 Hidden connections .............................................................................34 Asking Your Camera for Help .......................................................................35 Reviewing Basic Setup Options ...................................................................35 Cruising the Setup menu .....................................................................35 Browsing the Custom Setting menu ..................................................39 Choosing a storage folder ...................................................................43 Restoring default settings ...................................................................44 Chapter 2: Choosing Basic Picture Settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45 Choosing an Exposure Mode .......................................................................46 Choosing the Shutter-Release Mode ...........................................................48 Single Frame and Quiet modes ...........................................................49 Continuous (burst mode) shooting ...................................................50 Self-timer shooting ...............................................................................52 vi Nikon D7100 For Dummies Mirror lockup (MUP) ...........................................................................54 Off-the-dial shutter release features ..................................................55 Choosing the Right Image Size and Image Quality Settings .....................59 Diagnosing quality problems..............................................................60 Considering image size: How many pixels are enough? .................62 Understanding Image Quality options (JPEG or Raw) ....................66 JPEG: The imaging (and web) standard ............................................68 Raw (NEF): The purist’s choice ..........................................................70 Reducing the Image Area (DX versus 1.3x Crop) ......................................75 Chapter 3: Taking Great Pictures, Automatically . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 Setting Up for Automatic Success ...............................................................80 As Easy as It Gets: Auto and Auto Flash Off ...............................................83 Taking Advantage of Scene Modes ..............................................................85 Selecting a Scene mode .......................................................................87 Checking out the Scene(s) ..................................................................88 Chapter 4: Exploring Live View Photography and Movie Making . . . 93 Using Your Monitor as a Viewfinder ...........................................................93 Live View safety tips ............................................................................95 Customizing the Live View display ....................................................96 Displaying the Live View preview on an HDMI screen ....................98 Exploring Live View Focusing ....................................................................100 Choosing an Autofocus mode ..........................................................101 Setting the AF-area mode ..................................................................102 Stepping through the focusing process ..........................................103 Manual focusing in Live View mode ................................................106 Shooting Still Pictures in Live View Mode ................................................106 Shooting Movies ..........................................................................................109 Easy-does-it movie recording ...........................................................109 Adjusting basic recording settings ..................................................111 Screening Your Movies ...............................................................................121 Trimming Movies .........................................................................................123 Saving a Movie Frame as a Still Image .......................................................125 Part II: Working with Picture Files ............................ 127 Chapter 5: Playback Mode: Viewing, Erasing, and Protecting Photos . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129 Customizing Basic Playback Options ........................................................130 Adjusting playback timing ................................................................130 Enabling automatic picture rotation ...............................................131 vii Table of Contents Viewing Images in Playback Mode ............................................................132 Viewing multiple images at a time ...................................................134 Displaying photos in Calendar view ................................................135 Choosing which images to view .......................................................137 Magnifying photos during playback ................................................138 Viewing Picture Data ...................................................................................139 Choosing data-display options .........................................................141 File Information mode .......................................................................142 Highlights display mode ...................................................................144 RGB Histogram mode ........................................................................145 Shooting Data display mode .............................................................148 GPS Data mode ...................................................................................149 Overview mode ..................................................................................149 Deleting Photos ............................................................................................151 Deleting images one at a time ..........................................................151 Deleting all photos .............................................................................151 Deleting a batch of selected photos ................................................152 Hiding Photos during Playback .................................................................154 Protecting Photos ........................................................................................156 Creating a Slide Show ..................................................................................157 Viewing Your Photos on a Television .......................................................159 Chapter 6: Downloading, Printing, and Sharing Your Photos . . . . . . 161 Choosing the Right Photo Software ..........................................................162 Three free photo programs ..............................................................162 Advanced photo programs ...............................................................163 Sending Pictures to the Computer ............................................................164 Connecting the camera and computer ............................................165 Starting the transfer process ............................................................166 Downloading using ViewNX 2 ...........................................................167 Processing Raw (NEF) Files ........................................................................171 Processing Raw images in the camera ............................................171 Processing Raw files in ViewNX 2 ....................................................174 Planning for Perfect Prints .........................................................................178 Check the pixel count before you print ..........................................178 Allow for different print proportions ..............................................180 Get print and monitor colors in sync ..............................................182 Preparing Pictures for Online Use .............................................................183 Prepping online photos using ViewNX 2 .........................................184 Creating screen-friendly copies in the camera ..............................185 Copying Files from One Card to Another .................................................188 viii Nikon D7100 For Dummies Part III: Taking Creative Control ................................ 191 Chapter 7: Getting Creative with Exposure and Lighting . . . . . . . . . . 193 Introducing the Exposure Trio: Aperture, Shutter Speed, and ISO .......194 Understanding exposure-setting side effects .................................196 Doing the exposure balancing act ...................................................200 Exploring the Advanced Exposure Modes ...............................................201 Reading (And Adjusting) the Meter ..........................................................203 Setting Aperture, Shutter Speed, and ISO .................................................204 Adjusting aperture and shutter speed ............................................205 Controlling ISO ...................................................................................208 Choosing an Exposure Metering Mode .....................................................211 Sorting through Your Camera’s Exposure-Correction Tools .................215 Applying Exposure Compensation ..................................................215 Using Autoexposure Lock .................................................................219 Expanding tonal range with Active D-Lighting ...............................220 Exploring high dynamic range (HDR) photography ......................223 Working with Flash ......................................................................................227 Setting the Flash mode ......................................................................228 Adjusting flash output .......................................................................235 Locking flash exposure on your subject .........................................238 Exploring a few additional flash options.........................................239 Bracketing Exposures .................................................................................242 Bracketing exposure and flash .........................................................242 Bracketing Active D-Lighting ............................................................245 Chapter 8: Manipulating Focus and Color . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249 Mastering the Autofocusing System .........................................................250 Choosing an Autofocus mode ..........................................................252 Choosing an AF-area mode: One focus point or many? ................254 Choosing the right autofocus combo ..............................................255 Selecting (and locking) an autofocus point ....................................256 Autofocusing with still subjects: AF-S + Single Point.....................258 Focusing on moving subjects: AF-C + Dynamic Area.....................260 Exploring a few last autofocus tweaks ............................................261 Focusing Manually .......................................................................................262 Manipulating Depth of Field .......................................................................263 Controlling Color .........................................................................................268 Correcting colors with white balance .............................................268 Changing the White Balance setting ................................................270 Fine-tuning White Balance settings .................................................273 Creating custom White Balance presets .........................................274 Bracketing white balance ..................................................................280 Choosing a Color Space: sRGB versus Adobe RGB .................................283 Taking a Quick Look at Picture Controls ..................................................284