# P510 Auto vs Manual with same settings



## jekema (Jan 24, 2013)

Hello, I'm a bit of an amateur, and am just learning about magic like shutter speed / aperture settings, etc...

I have a P510 and actually have not been as impressed with it as I thought I would.... BUT that's another story...

What I am currently mystified about is why I can't match the pictures I take on Auto mode with pictures I take on Manual mode with the same shutter speed / aperture settings...

Case in point, last night the moon was pretty bright, so I thought I would see what kind of pictures I could get...

Here is a picture I took on Auto mode... the camera said it was using 1 sec shutter speed and aperture of F3.5:

http://jamesekema.com/pictures/P510 Auto.jpg

So I set the camera to Manual mode, with a 1 second shutter speed and aperture of F3.5... and this is the picture I get:

http://jamesekema.com/pictures/P510 Manual.jpg

What's the deal? :raisedbrow:  I feel like I must be missing something...

Thanks in advance! 


Also, thought I'd share, this is a picture I took a few days ago of a (IMHO) pretty cool sunset:

http://jamesekema.com/pictures/1-18-13 Sunset.jpg


----------



## ph0enix (Jan 24, 2013)

The deal is that when you had the camera in Auto, it chose the ISO of 1600.  When you set it manually you used ISO 100 which allowed 4 times less light onto the sensor so the photo is severely underexposed.  Read up on the exposure triangle:
Learning about Exposure ? The Exposure Triangle

There are 3 relevant settings, not 2: ISO, Aperture and Shutter Speed.


----------



## jekema (Jan 26, 2013)

Ahh, thank you so much!
I was wondering if ISO had something to do with it, but didn't really know anything about ISO, and didn't even realize I could set it on the Nikon P510.  Even in Manual mode, where you can easily change shutterspeed and aperture, it's not obvious how to change the ISO settings... You are forced to go into the Menu -> ISO Sensitivity -> ISO Sensitivity -> then pick the ISO setting... (100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, 3200, or "Hi 1" (whatever that is))...

I will have to do some more research on ISO, and play around with those settings...

Thanks for taking the time to help out a newbie! :hail:


----------



## ph0enix (Jan 26, 2013)

jekema said:


> Ahh, thank you so much!
> I was wondering if ISO had something to do with it, but didn't really know anything about ISO, and didn't even realize I could set it on the Nikon P510.  Even in Manual mode, where you can easily change shutterspeed and aperture, it's not obvious how to change the ISO settings... You are forced to go into the Menu -> ISO Sensitivity -> ISO Sensitivity -> then pick the ISO setting... (100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, 3200, or "Hi 1" (whatever that is))...
> 
> I will have to do some more research on ISO, and play around with those settings...
> ...



ISO is the digital sensor's sensitivity to light.  100 (lowest setting on your camera) being the least sensitive, Hi 1 (6,400 equivalent) the most sensitive.  100 also happens to be your camera's native ISO.   When you double or half the ISO value, you double or half the amount of light recorded by the sensor.  As you increase the ISO, the level of noise in the images will increase.  That's why you see so much noise in the picture shot at 1,600.


----------



## jekema (Jan 26, 2013)

ph0enix said:


> ISO is the digital sensor's sensitivity to light.  100 (lowest setting on your camera) being the least sensitive, Hi 1 (6,400 equivalent) the most sensitive.  100 also happens to be your camera's native ISO.   When you double or half the ISO value, you double or half the amount of light recorded by the sensor.  As you increase the ISO, the level of noise in the images will increase.  That's why you see so much noise in the picture shot at 1,600.



Gotcha!  Thanks for the further explanation...

And thanks for this link:  Learning about Exposure ? The Exposure Triangle

I read through this article and the ISO links, and this helped explain this quite a bit...  I will definitely be playing with my ISO settings in the future...

Thanks again!  :thumbup:


----------

