Camera Preset Modes

Auto Mode

Automatic Exposure is when the camera chooses the optimum shutter speed, aperture, ISO and flash settings for your shot. All you need to do is point and shoot. This can be good if you have no idea of what settings to choose and also when you need to shoot quickly. The shot here is correctly exposed as the day is well lit, though auto-exposure may struggle in situations where the light is uneven, and it tends to trigger the flash even when it’s not necessary.

Portrait Mode

Portrait mode will “think” that there is a subject in the foreground of the frame and choose a shallow depth of field to keep the human subject in focus but the background blurred. If the camera reads the scene as dark, it will add fill-in flash. Fill-in flash is useful in sunny conditions too, when the sun casts a harsh shadow. Portrait mode generally works best in well-lit conditions.

Sports Mode

Because sports are fast-paced activities, sports mode will give you a high shutter speed of at least 1/500 – 1/1000 of a second. With a high shutter speed to freeze movement, means that the flash is usually not necessary – though once again this works best on a bright day. Sports mode can work well alongside continuous shooting mode, where images are taken consecutively resulting in many shots that capture the action.

Advanced Camera Modes

On most DSLR cameras, there will also be the letter modes – M (Manual), AV (Aperture-Priority), TV or S (Shutter-Priority) and P (Programmed Auto). Manual mode required the photographer to set every single setting. Aperture-Priority allows the photographer to set the aperture value and the camera automatically sets the correct shutter speed. TV lets the photographer choose the shutter speed first (for example when shooting sports), and the camera automatically sets the correct aperture. P-Program mode is similar to Auto mode in that the shutter and aperture settings are determined by the camera, but the photographer can adjust other settings manually.