Hi - I have a Sony Cyber-shot DSC-P200 and I've been trying to use it to take photos of supercross (motorcycle racing inside stadiums). All the shots came out blurry on the default mode so when I switched to Manual and increased the shutter speed they aren't blurry anymore, but they have all kinds of white/light spots. Can anyone suggest a way to correct this or just tell me what would cause it? - thanks
Not very good description, and not enough to ascertain the problem or proper course of action to correct the problem. Anything could be causing the spots.
Here's the setting I used and a sample pic: Shutter Speed = 1000 Aperture = F2.8 White balance = Auto ISO = 400 Saturation = Normal Contrast = Normal Sharpness = Normal Picuture Quality = Fine Metering Mode = Multi Focus Multi = AF
It looks like lens flare. Caused by stray light across the lens and gets picked up by the sensor. It can happen at wide open apertures and specially if you are at an event with lots flashes. A lens hood will usually fix this problem.
However, pay attention to the position of the spots. If the angle is different and the spots are always in the same place, it is not lens flare. It could be dust on your sensor or your lens.
Thanks. Yeah, the spots are always in different spots. It's very frustrating because I've yet to be able to take ONE good action shot with this camera, whereas my old 2mp Olympus produced much better results. I couldn't see these spots on the lcd so I thought I was getting decent shots only to see this later. So now I have 300 spotty pics from that race. I mean, I don't know anything about photography, but you'd think a point and shoot like the cybershot that gets rave reviews would produce better results. It's probably user error, but it's still frustrating.
Unfortunately, that camera is not meant to take photos like the ones you seem to favor. It is not fast enough. Try getting a lens hood or a makeshift hood, from a styrofoam cup for example. Take the bottm out of the cup and place it over the lens to keep any reflection from splashing all over your lens.
An event like that really makes a mess of things because of all the flash going off everywhere.
