Outdoor Photography How To

Let’s face it: your camera has a lot of settings, probably more than you will ever need. And while many of those settings can be helpful, some are unnecessary, and others might actually be counterproductive.

Pro photographers who spend a lot of time understanding the intricacies of their cameras realize this and deliberately turn off some settings, which either get in the way or might negatively affect your photos. In the below video, landscape pro Mark Denney explains seven camera settings that pro photographers turn off that beginners don’t (but probably should).

“There are a ton of videos, articles, and podcasts dedicated to the best camera settings for certain genres of photography but understanding which camera settings to turn off is just as important as understanding which ones to turn on,” Denney says. “In this video, I'll review the seven camera settings I always turn off for landscape photography and all but one of the settings covered here could potentially ruin your photos and the other one might not ruin your image, but it could drive you absolutely crazy!”

Here are the seven camera settings he argues you should immediately turn off when shooting landscape photos.

#1 Continuous Autofocus

“I never want my camera to be constantly focusing on a landscape scene,” Denney explains. “I want to be able to lock focus one time and that’s it. I don’t want to have my cameras hunting for something moving throughout my scene.”

#2 Auto ISO

“From my experience, Auto ISO always selects an ISO that is higher than what I would have selected. I would be up for Auto ISO if I was more confident in it.”

#3 Remove Autofocus from Shutter Button

“Turn off the autofocus trigger from the shutter release and move it to a back button on the camera. It really is a game-changer because when you have both autofocus and shutter release on one button, sometimes it can create focus drift or focus shift and ruin a photograph.”

#4 Special Picture Profiles

“All cameras nowadays have Picture Profiles you can select whether it’s Landscape or Vivid, but I always leave my Picture Profiles on Standard or Flat because I want to be able to capture as much dynamic range as I possibly can.”

#5 IBIS (In Body Image Stabilization)

“Since I’m always on a tripod, I don’t need to have In Body Image Stabilization turned on. I did assign it to a button on the top of my camera so I can quickly turn IBIS on if, for whatever case, I’m shooting handheld.”

#6 All the Beeps!

“This will not ruin a photograph, but it will drive you absolutely crazy and ruin the ambiance of your shoot. Turn off all the beeps!"

#7 Long Exposure Noise Reduction

“There might be some cameras out there that are really good at doing this, but I always turn it off because I don’t want my camera being in charge of any reduction at all. I want to be able to do that in post processing.”