Event Photography Tips for Newbies

Before shooting Manila events with an SLR, there's more to than just bringing your camera there and clicking away. I'm assuming you know how to change the ISO on the camera, but you are having difficulty deciding what ISO to choose?

There are three factors that determine exposure; shutter speed, aperture and ISO. These are referred to as the exposure triangle. Each one has a different effect on your final image and you need to visualize what you are trying to accomplish and then make your exposure choices based on those decisions. Here is an excellent book that will teach you almost everything you need to know about the exposure triangle, I recommend it highly.

http://www.amazon.com/Understanding-Exposure-Photographs-Digital-Updated/dp/0817463003/

Basically this is the deal with ISO. The ISO is essentially the sensitivity of your camera's sensor to light. At the lowest setting (usually 100) there will generally be the least amount of noise. The higher the setting, the worse the noise. The reasons you want to use a high ISO is when the light is low, and you need to keep the shutter speed fast to avoid blurring images. Since noisy is preferable to blurry, this is a trade-off you will sometimes accept. Reasons to use a low ISO, when you want the cleanest image possible and shutter speed is not necessarily an issue...like bright sunny days in Philippines or when shooting on a tripod. As you use your camera during the event, you will learn at what point ISO noise becomes an issue. As technology has progressed, we can push cameras much farther now than in the past. There are just too many scenarios to list here, but this gives you an idea what kind of things to take in consideration. Trust me, get the book and read it.

Next, the 75-300 is heavy? Hardly, it's actually quite a lightweight to carry around during the event. As far as stabilization, none of the Canon bodies have it. Stabilization is built into the lenses on Canon equipment, not the body...so I'm not sure what you're referring to there.

As far as editing, I don't think flickr has that capability...picasa does, you may want to try that one...it's tied in with Google+ nowadays.