Digital Picture Help

[michaelb]

I got an optio w30 over the summer for use hiking and kayaking and skiing. I love that is tough and waterproof, and it takes pretty good pics outdoors. But I have this weird problem with indoor pics in medium or low light, some of the time:

http://picasaweb.google.com/michaelb5555...6755096482

This only occurs with the flash, so seems related to that. It may happen less if I switch to "soft flash". I have been playing with ISO settings and other stuff (I don't have that many manual settings on the camera) to try to speed up the shutter, but haven't really noticed much difference there. I first noticed this problem though before I messed around with anything. I just shot some pics of the same wall from the same angle with the same light on (although it is night now and that was during the day) and I didn't get this effect.

So I know there are a bunch of photography experts here, so any help or insight figuring out what causes this and how to get rid of it would be great. Thanks.

[Kraniac]

Micaelb,

It's a specialized phenomenon that is often attributed to using a camera that has this combination of things: 1) a flash that is very close to the lens 2) A very small digital sensor 3) An extreme wide angle lens to accomodate that small sensor (it's a basic photo law that I won't get into here, the sensor is small so you need a wider lens to approximate a "normalish" view).

When you have all of those things going on and there is dust floating in the air, VERY close to the lens, when you fire the camera, it gets illuminated by the flash...since the dust is so close to the lens, it is out of focus, and creates a haloed appearance when the flash illuminates it.

You know how beams of light coming in through a window will clearly illuminate dust in the air? It's almost like the dust is lit up, glowing. It's just like that. You've seen pictures where out of focus lights form soft circles? Same thing only it's all happening directly in front of your lens.

The pic you referenced is cool though cause the orbs recede into a sort of perspective. Maybe those are the ghosts of all the dead hamsters from your childhood, in order of which one you liked best.

[michaelb]

Thanks a lot. Dust, never would have guessed that. I wonder if this is happening more with this camera than before because I was also using a small gorillapod tripod. I was using the tripod in the hope that would sharpen the focus in the low light, but that also means the pics are at at a low angle shooting up, and that might catch more dust.

[max]

Shooting without the flash eliminates the reflections. Tripod helps.
You may lighten up in PS later.

By no means am I a photo expert, but we see a lot of these when we shoot pictures documenting our work....