I know that is a strange title to a blog post, but I finally got a little brave and decided to try to take pictures using the manual setting on my camera. I have had my new Nikon D3100 for about a year now and have really loved it! I have mainly been using the auto setting, as well as some of what I call the 'dummy' settings (landscape, flower, portrait, etc.)
By adjusting the aperture and shutter speed, I was able to capture these images over the weekend at our Civil War event in Mariposa:
f/13, 1/200 seconds
f/20, 30 seconds
f/25, 1.3 seconds
f/6.3, 1/200 seconds
f/16, 1/20 seconds
f/9, 1/50 seconds
f/10, 1/30 seconds
f/25, 1/25 seconds
I should probably mention that these are straight out of the camera shots, nothing has been cropped and I don't use Photoshop.
As far as the event itself, it sure was a hot weekend. Just last week, we had torential downpours of rain and the weather decided to heat up quite a bit for our weekend. The hot weather makes it quite miserable while you are wearing wool uniform or many layers of women's clothing. The lack of accesible shade also makes it a little difficult to stay cool during the day.
However, the location is absolutely beautiful, just 30 minutes west of Yosemite. Since the location is pretty remote, the night time sky was amazing! With the new moon, the sky was filled with stars! We had a great time pointing out Venus, Mars, Saturn, Orion's Belt, and many other stars and constellations.
The end of a hot, camping weekend always makes us so thankful for clean, running, hot water and the comforts of our home. It is also a blessing to be away from all our technology and be able to have great face-to-face conversations with people who share the love for the history of our country.