Question for D5000 Owners...

[Zamchris]

Hi All,

This is my first post, though I've been thoroughly enjoying the tutorials and other content for a while from my mobile phone and limited internet cafe time. I'm a Peace Corps Volunteer in rural Zambia, and during my free time I enjoy pursuing photography in this once in a lifetime setting. I shoot with a recently acquired Nikon D5000, but have very limited access to post production facilities, aside from the in-camera processing/edits and an aging computer equipped with Paint and MS photo editor at the office. I was wondering if there are any more experienced D5000 users out there that could offer me pointers on making the most of the in-camera capabilities, or how to make the most out of what is available to me. Thanks a lot, I’ve learned so much from this site, and everyone’s work always blows me away when I’m able to view it.

Some of my more recent photos are at: Chris Katongo Audette's Photos - New Camera, a Wedding, and Groundnuts | Facebook

Any suggestions are welcome!

[OsmosisStudios]

Easy stuff: Storage. Store your photos until you get somewhere that DOES have better access to that kind of thing.

[Zamchris]

Originally Posted by OsmosisStudios

Easy stuff: Storage. Store your photos until you get somewhere that DOES have better access to that kind of thing.

Thanks, Osmosis, got that, and I save everything to bring home to process properly (in 2 years!). That being said, I'm just curious about what I can do to raise the bar on what I post online. Any thoughts?

[RecurrentNerve]

Well, I would say the two most useful tools in-camera are Trim and Quick Re-touch. If I have a good shot, generally the only things I will do in Photoshop are cropping and playing with the levels a bit to boost colour and contrast. The camera does both of these pretty well. The Colour Balance tool will also probably be quite useful, but I've never really used it.

If you ever get the chance to get online (not sure how easy this is in Zambia but I'm guessing there might be an Internet cafe or two) try downloading GIMP and putting it on a memory stick or CD (it's only around 25mb). It has pretty much the same functionality as Photoshop so if your regular computer can run it you're made in the shade.

[Zamchris]

Thanks, I didn't consider trying to run GIMP off a jump drive, I'll be trying that. I do make use of color balance a lot, mostly through customising the white balance during the raw to jpg conversion which is usually my fist step. I'm impressed with the in-camera capabilities, though it's frustrating to edit on an LCD!