How to Pick the Right Camera Settings for Every Scenario

Fresh from telling us to stop asking about camera settings, Tony Northrup is back with a 17-minute video going in depth on the general camera settings he uses for specific situations, imparting knowledge along with over 50 sample pictures.

Northrup’s previous video explained how knowing the exact camera settings a photographer used to take a shot is not useful in itself. This follow-up video expands on that by providing the context for each shot and reasoning behind the choice of camera settings.

Photographers have to keep a lot in their head while they’re on a shoot. As Northrup says, you have to consider things like composition, choosing the right background, posing your model, making sure they have no fly-aways or makeup issues, as well as the lighting, shutter speed, aperture, and ISO.

Some of these things begin to become second nature over time and with practice, but at first, this can cause information overload. Trying to memorize and copy another photographer’s camera settings is not going to help you, but understanding why they used those camera settings and which aspects of the settings are more critical in certain scenarios is important.

For that purpose, Northrup’s video is a wealth of information as he shows 50+ images along with an explanation of why he used the camera settings that he did.