Preface

You don’t expect good pictures from your new Canon EOS 90D—you demand outstanding photos. After all, the 90D is currently the most advanced APS-C enthusiast camera in the Canon lineup. It boasts 32.5 megapixels of resolution with amazing low-light capabilities, blazing-fast automatic focus, and both 4K and full HD video capabilities. But your gateway to pixel proficiency is dragged down by the too-brief condensed guide included in the box, and the comprehensive manual is available only as an inconvenient PDF download.

You know everything you need to know is available—somewhere—but you don’t know where to start. In addition, the manuals offer little information on digital photography techniques. Nor are you interested in spending hours or days studying a comprehensive book on digital SLR photography that doesn’t necessarily apply directly to your 90D.

What you need is a guide that explains the purpose and function of the 90D’s basic controls, how you should use them, and why. Ideally, there should be information about using the camera’s impressive new focus bracketing feature, high-resolution capabilities, exposure techniques, and the special autofocus modes. But you’d prefer to read about those topics only after you’ve had the chance to go out and take a few hundred great pictures with your new camera. Why isn’t there a book that summarizes the most important information in its first two or three chapters, with lots of illustrations showing what your results will look like when you use this setting or that? This is that book.

If you can’t decide on what basic settings to use with your camera because you can’t figure out how changing ISO or white balance or focus defaults will affect your pictures, you need this guide. I won’t talk down to you, either; this book isn’t padded with dozens of pages of checklists telling you how to take a travel picture, a sports photo, or how to take a snapshot of your kids in overly simplistic terms. There are no special sections devoted to “real-world” recipes here. All of us do 100 percent of our shooting in the real world! So, I give you all the information you need to cook up great photos on your own!