Canon EOS Rebel T8i/850D For Dummies. Julie Adair King

Shooting Display Settings menu. Otherwise, screens you see on your camera won’t match the figures in this book, and some instructions won’t work as spelled out, either.

      Also note that menu offerings change depending on your exposure mode — Scene Intelligent Auto, P, SCN, and so on — and whether the camera is set to Movie mode, Live View photography mode, or viewfinder photography mode. For now, put the camera in still photo mode (the On/Off switch should be set to On) and exit Live View mode if it’s active. (The Live View button is just to the right of the viewfinder and is marked with a camera symbol.) Then rotate the Mode dial on top of the camera to the P, Tv, Av, or M position. You can adjust all the camera’s options only in these advanced exposure modes.

      Note that when you shoot in Live View or Movie mode, some menus offer additional or different options than when you use the viewfinder. I mention these options in the following lists even though they don’t appear in the accompanying figures, which feature the menus as they appear during viewfinder shooting. Yeah, I know, this is all getting fairly dense; don’t panic, the goal here is just to give you a menu overview that you can access quickly. I detail many settings further when discussing the relevant shooting topics later in the book.

      Setup Menu 1

      Display Setup Menu 1, shown in Figure 1-34, to access the following options:

       Select Folder: By default, your camera creates an initial file-storage folder named 100Canon and puts as many as 9,999 images in that folder. When you reach image 9999, the camera creates a new folder, named 101Canon, for your next 9,999 images. The camera also creates a new folder if you perform a manual file-numbering reset (details are provided later in this section).Choose Select Folder to see the list of folders on your memory card. If the card contains multiple folders, the currently selected one is highlighted. The number to the right of the folder name shows you how many pictures are in the folder. You also see a thumbnail view of the first and last pictures in the folder, along with the file numbers of those two photos. To choose a different folder, tap it or press the top or bottom edge of the Quick Control dial to select it and then press the Set button. You also can create a new folder by choosing the Create Folder setting on the menu screen; Chapter 11 provides details on this feature.FIGURE 1-34: Setup Menu 1 contains the Format Card option with a handful of others.

       File Numbering: This option controls how the camera names your picture files. After selecting File Numbering from the menu, choose the Numbering option to select one of these choices:Continuous: This is the default; the camera numbers your files sequentially, from 0001 to 9999, and places all images in the same folder (100Canon, by default) unless you specify otherwise using the Select Folder option. The numbering sequence is retained even if you change memory cards.When you reach picture 9999, the camera automatically creates a new folder (101Canon, by default) and restarts the file numbering at 0001 — again, the folder issue is dependent on the status of the Select Folder option. Auto Reset: File numbering restarts at 0001 each time you put in a different memory card or create a new folder. It’s easy to wind up with multiple photos that have the same file number if you’re not careful about storing them in separate folders. So think twice — or maybe three times — about using this option.You also find a separate option, Manual Reset. Select this setting to begin a new numbering sequence starting at 0001. A new folder is automatically created to store your new files. The camera then returns to whichever Numbering mode is selected (Continuous or Auto Reset). Beware of one gotcha that applies to both the Continuous and Auto Reset options: If you swap memory cards and the new card already contains images, the camera may pick up numbering from the last image on the new card, which throws a monkey wrench into things. To avoid this problem, transfer the images to your computer or hard drive and format the new card before putting it into the camera, as explained later in this list.

       Auto Rotate: This option determines whether vertically oriented pictures are rotated to appear upright during picture playback or when you view them in a photo editor. Stick with the default “On” setting, represented by the icon shown in Figure 1-34, until you explore Chapter 9, which discusses this and other playback issues. This setting doesn’t affect movies. See the next bullet point for a similar item that does come into play for movie recording.

       Add Movie Rotate Info: If you set the camera to Movie mode (rotate the On/Off switch to the movie-camera position), the menu displays this option. When enabled, this feature inserts into the movie data information about whether you held the camera vertically or horizontally when shooting the movie. Movies that you shot in the vertical orientation then play back in the same orientation as recorded when you display them on a smartphone or other smart device. You can read more about this movie-recording feature in Chapter 8.

       Format Card: Choose this option to wipe the installed memory card clean of all contents and ensure that it’s properly prepared for use in the camera. For extra-deep cleaning, select the Low-Level formatting box after you select the menu option. However, the standard formatting (Low-Level box unchecked) is usually adequate.

      Setup Menu 2

Setup Menu 2, posing in Figure 1-35, contains these options:

      FIGURE 1-35: Through the first option on this menu, you can adjust the delay time of the camera’s automatic shutdown feature.

       Auto Power Off: To save battery power, the camera automatically goes to sleep after a certain period of inactivity. At the default setting, the camera nods off after only 10 seconds unless the camera is in Playback mode, Live View mode, or Movie mode, in which case it waits until 30 seconds have passed.You can adjust this timing so that 30 seconds is the minimum delay time (the 10-second variation is disabled at the 30-second setting). Or you can extend the delay up to as long as 15 minutes. To disable auto shutdown altogether, select Off — but be aware that even at that setting, the monitor still turns off if you ignore the camera for 30 minutes.Regardless of the shutoff time you select, you can bring the camera out of hibernation mode by giving the shutter button a quick half-press and release or by pressing the DISP button.

       Disp. Brightness: This option enables you to make the monitor display brighter or darker. But if you take this step, what you see on the display may not be an accurate rendition of exposure. The default setting is 4, which is the position at the midpoint of the brightness scale.

       Screen Off/On Btn: Through this option, available only for viewfinder photography, you tell the camera what to do with regards to the Quick Control display when you press the shutter button halfway. At the default setting, Shutter Btn, your half-press of the button then turns the monitor off, and releasing the button turns the monitor back on.Option 2, Shutter/DISP, still results in the monitor shutting itself off when you half-press the shutter button, but to bring the monitor back to life, you have to press the DISP button. And Option 3, Remains On, lives up to its name: The screen stays on even after you press the shutter button halfway. If you want to shut the monitor off, you have to press the INFO button.I suggest keeping this one set to the default (Shutter Btn.). Whatever you choose, remember that the setting has no effect during Live View or movie shooting. In fact, if the camera is in Movie mode or Live View is turned on, the option disappears from the menu.

       Date/Time/Zone: If you didn’t do so when following the initial camera setup steps at the start of this chapter, enter the time, date, and time zone now. Keeping the date/time accurate is important because