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Guide to Scene Modes

Compact digital cameras always have an auto-everything point-and-shoot mode, with autofocus, auto-exposure, auto white balance, auto flash and auto ISO. You might imagine that these would take care of every conceivable picture-taking opportunity, but manufacturers also include ‘scene’ modes customised for specific types of photo.

Many beginner-orientated DSLRs include scene modes too, though semi-pro and pro cameras don’t have them. The makers and the users probably feel that they’re now beyond such simple hand-holding and that they’re perfectly capable of working out the best settings for themselves.

However, even high-end cameras offer ways of fine-tuning the colour and tonal response of the camera. These settings aren’t called ‘scene modes’, but they nevertheless work in a similar way. Canon DSLRs, for example, have ‘Picture Styles’ customised for portraits, landscapes and other types of image. Fujifilm’s FinePix S5 Pro has a variety of ‘film simulation’ modes for mimicking the high contrast and saturation of colour transparency film, for example, or the softer gradations of colour negative stock. Nikon DSLRs, meanwhile, have a range of ‘Optimization’ modes for portraits, landscapes, ‘vivid’, ‘softer’ and other kinds of image rendition.

DSLRs and most compacts also offer manual adjustment of image contrast, saturation and sharpness. To a degree you can customise the ‘look’ of your photos, although each DSLR model does tend to have its own ‘look’ which is subtly different to any other, and which persists despite any adjustments you might make to the in-camera settings or later on in your image editor.

We will take a look at compact camera scene modes first. The scene modes in compact digital cameras often have a much wider scope – they don’t just adjust the image processing but take over some important camera functions too. This is highly relevant if you use a point-and-shoot compact as a portable alternative to a DSLR camera and want to get the best out of it.

The most obvious function of a scene mode is to improve the rendition of specific types of subject. The assumption is, of course, that the camera settings will be carefully ‘tuned’ to the scene you’re photographing. Actually, though, there are two secondary advantages to scene modes. No automated system is truly ‘intelligent’, and you can cut down the camera’s room for error by being more specific about what you’re photographing. For example, in Landscape mode the camera may set the focus to infinity – this cuts shutter lag and eliminates the risk of focusing mistakes.

Second, scene modes can save you a lot of time. If you’re taking photographs in a gallery or a museum you’ll need to switch off the flash and increase the ISO. But many cameras have a Museum mode, which does this for you.

It’s worth spending some time with your compact camera and its manual to find out what the scene modes do and how they work. You might well conclude that the majority are gimmicks, but it’s likely you’ll find at least a couple that are genuinely useful.

The camera’s scene modes usually make adjustments to the image contrast, saturation and sharpness. Some may also adjust the white balance. These adjustments are applied as the raw sensor data is processed and converted into a JPEG image file.

The camera carries out the same processing steps in normal program AE mode, except that in the scene modes the settings will be ‘tuned’ for that particular subject instead of applied in a generic way.

These processing changes can usually be applied manually using the contrast, saturation and sharpness adjustments in the camera’s menus, so do you really need these scene modes at all? Maybe. Some of the scene modes work more subtly. A Landscape mode, for example, might increase the saturation of blues and greens, and this kind of selective colour adjustment isn’t something you can do manually. Scene modes may also include specific white balance settings, such as in Candlelight or Sunset modes.

More interestingly, though, scene modes may also alter the camera’s shooting settings. This could prove especially significant with basic cameras that offer few manual controls. These can include focusing options, flash mode, ISO and aperture/shutter speed combinations.

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