Crazy Questions

[Kaye]

I have a crazy question. I take most of my photo's in aperture mode and have been pretty happy for the most part except with my inside photos. I have tried every mode for taking photos inside and I just, well am terrible at it. The types of photos I'm talking about are just candid shots of my family sitting around for Christmas or birthday parties inside, etc. They are just not as sharp as I would like and the background will be to dark in some of them. I hope this is making sense. Every now and then I will get lucky and one will turn out nice.

Is this a problem with the lighting inside? I do have to adjust the -/+ for most of my inside photos.

I did notice one thing that I'm not sure has anything to do with this, but does puzzle me and hope someone can help me with the answer. I noticed that anytime I take a photo in Aperture mode (Program Auto also) and use the built in flash, that the Shutter Speed is 1/60....Is that a default ss for the flash? or what?

Thanks for any help you guys can give me.

[OsmosisStudios]

Post some examples: it's easier to provide some kind of information with samples.

[PhotogChic]

not sure if you can do this with Nikons...but can you dial up your exposure by a stop? That could help. Also, if you are shooting indoors with an aperature of around 5 or higher, the shutter speed is going to decrease to allow for enough light to hit the sensor; when you have a slower than 1/100 (some even say 1/125) you are going to see the result of hand/camera shake making your photos slightly blurry. I don't have any direct links but try searching for the "exposure triangle" to help you with these issues...DPS has some great articles about it!

the 1/60 is the result of a complicated mathematical algorithm your camera's processor uses to figure the shutter speed...that's about as detailed as I can get as I am just learning this from my camera manual.

at some point, you might want to get an off-camera flash to improve the indoor/natural lighting.

hth!

EDIT: not sure what ISO you are shooting at indoors but you can try to increase that to 400 or 800 to see if that improves these issues...

[Kaye]

Here is as close as I can get. I usually delete the photos that I don't like. This is what I have problems with, more than one person in a photo and keeping everyone in focus.
PhotogChic: I'm thinking you are right. Maybe the slow shutter speed (1/60) is what is causing the not so sharp image. And I am assuming that it is the Flash Shutter Speed set at 1/60. But I'm not sure what to set in on for indoors. I would rather use the -/+ on the flash or camera to get the light right and not give up my sharp focus. I have no problem with the Ap. mode outside, but I'm not using a flash and the shutter speed seems to adjust for the situation.

[OsmosisStudios]

What's unsharp about that?

[Kaye]

You don't think the little one in the middle is not as sharp as the others? Maybe it is just me, but I do think the photo is a little dark in the middle and the background.

[Chip]

Maybe you're noticing a depth of field issue?

As a really, really rough general rule, the part of a photo that's in acceptably sharp focus is 1/3 in front of your subject and 2/3 behind your subject. When you're taking a photo of people at varied distances, picking your focus point with this rule in mind should help you get more of your subjects in sharp focus.

And for your "dark background" issue, it's likely that you need to add more ambient light into your photos. This planet neil site has a lot of good information about how to do just that. On his site, look at the "exposure metering" and "flash photography techniques" topics on the right hand side of the page.

Hope this helps.