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Changing Perspectives – Taking Advantage of the Rear Screen

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A common complaint about point and shoot and other digital cameras with small or non-existent viewfinders is that it’s difficult to shoot using the rear screen, especially outdoors where the daylight can overpower the screen and make it difficult to see what you’re shooting.

Lately, I’ve been working with the Sony NEX-7 and a99 cameras, which both have electronic viewfinders and movable rear screens, and I’ve found some situations where the rear screen gives you some real advantages over the viewfinder.

First, it’s great for ‘run and gun’ style shooting where you can whip the camera out and shoot without taking the time to compose through the viewfinder, and capture a great moment that you might miss otherwise. Holding the camera away from your face also allows you to maintain eye contact with your subjects, which can put people more at ease in front of the camera and make it easier to capture more natural moments and expressions when you’re shooting portraits or lifestyle.

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It’s also great to play around with the different perspectives you can get by shooting with the camera away from your face. Tilt the screen up, down or sideways and you can see what you’re shooting with the camera in almost any position. Having the freedom to move your camera around and still see the shot opens up a whole range of shooting options that can’t be achieved with your eye up to the viewfinder. In this shot I pushed my Sony a99 camera in really close for the shot and pulled it away at the last minute to avoid the rider.

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I found another unexpected use of the rear screen on a recent project. I was on a mountain bike shoot in the desert, with my Sony NEX-7 in my pack and noticed some cool looking dead branches on the ground next to the trail. I thought it would be interesting to shoot through the branches, framing the mountain biker in the branches, but there was no way I could lie down on the ground to position the camera properly in the branches and get my face up to the viewfinder. I placed the NEX-7 on the ground and tilted the rear screen up so I could frame the shot exactly as I wanted while kneel a couple of feet behind the camera. Here’s what it looked like.

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It feels natural to put the camera up to your eye and shoot thru the viewfinder. It’s the way we’ve all been doing it for years. But, the world of photography is changing rapidly and as cameras evolve it’s important to learn as much as possible about new camera features, and use them to your advantage to improve your craft. This is just one example where a simple feature that might be considered an annoyance can help you create better images.



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