When you’re in playback mode, turn the Main dial. By default, the camera will jump forward or backward 10 images at a time. A scroll bar will appear to show you where you are in within the current selection.

Figure 3-3. By default, the camera jumps forward or backward by 10 images when you turn the Main dial in playback mode.

You can change how many intervals the Main dial jumps by pressing the up arrow key. The jump interval indicator next to the scroll bar will become editable. Use the up and down arrow keys to change the interval to 1, 10, or 100 images, or to Date. When set to Date, the Main dial will jump to the next image shot on a different day.

Figure 3-4. You can change the interval by which the Main dial will jump images.

When reviewing an image, you can zoom in to view fine details and assess focus. To zoom in to an image during image playback, press the Zoom In button. The XS can zoom in up to 10 times. As you zoom in, notice the navigation panel that appears superimposed over your image.

Figure 3-5. Using the zoom buttons, you can get a closer view of your image and pan around to examine details.

This shows a relative illustration of which part of the image you’re viewing. The white box shows you which part of your image is currently being displayed.

You can easily perform a quick experiment to learn more about how sharpness on the XS’s LCD screen relates to the sharpness in your final image:

The easiest way to exit playback mode is to give the shutter button a half-press, just as if you were autofocusing. You can also exit playback by pressing the Play button.

THE SET UP: CHANGING THE BRIGHTNESS OF THE LCD SCREEN

If you’re in bright sunlight, it may be hard to see the camera’s LCD screen clearly when viewing images. You can change the brightness of the screen by using the LCD brightness command in the tool menu 2.

The LCD brightness command gives you seven levels of brightness to choose from. Using the LCD brightness command is very straightforward, but if you need help, refer to Switching to Program Mode of the XS user manual.

If you’re shooting in a dark location, you might want to turn the brightness of the screen down, since a very bright screen can be hard on your eyes if they’re already adjusted to low light.

In addition to zooming in to an image to view fine detail, you can also zoom out from an image to view more than one image on the screen at a time. Canon calls this index display, but I prefer to refer to it as thumbnail view. Whatever you choose to call it, viewing multiple images at once makes it easier to navigate quickly to a specific image on the card.

To zoom out to a thumbnail display of all the images on the card, follow these steps:

Using these two simple controls, Zoom In and Zoom Out, you can easily move from up-close views of your images to thumbnail views that provide speedier navigation.

Like most digital cameras, the XS automatically stores a fair amount of information with every image you shoot. This information, commonly referred to as metadata, is embedded in the image file, so it travels with the image as you copy and move files around.

In addition to the date and time you take an image, the XS stores all essential exposure information—aperture, shutter speed, ISO, white balance setting, exposure compensation, and much more. Because this metadata conforms to an accepted standard called EXIF, most any image editor can read the data. Having access to your shooting parameters while editing can make certain corrections much easier and help you learn what you did right or wrong while shooting.

You can also view EXIF metadata data on the camera itself, and you’ve already seen a small example of it when viewing your images. The shutter speed and aperture displays that have appeared in your image playback are two bits of EXIF metadata.

To change the image metadata that’s displayed, follow these steps:

The metadata that the XS displays can be an invaluable aid in difficult shooting situations. However, you don’t have to look at it all the time. When you’re out in the field shooting, you want the bulk of your attention focused on shooting, not on reviewing your images. In later chapters we’ll revisit these modes, and you’ll gain a better understanding of what they’re for and when to use them.

Your camera contains an orientation sensor that it uses to determine whether you’re shooting in portrait or landscape orientation (that is, vertically or horizontally). The orientation you use is automatically stored in the metadata of each image. Your image editor can most likely read this data and will automatically rotate the image appropriately.

You can also tell the camera to automatically rotate the images so that they always display at the largest size possible. By default, this feature is turned on, but if you want to turn it off (perhaps because you’re working with the camera mounted on a tripod or because you have the camera connected to a TV), then go to the tools menu 1 and select Auto rotate.

You’ll see three options in the Auto rotate menu:

Figure 3-10. The Auto rotate menu lets you control whether the camera will automatically rotate images.

Sometimes autorotation gets confused and images don’t get properly rotated. This can be because you were holding the camera at an odd angle or possibly because you changed orientation and shot very quickly. Whatever the reason, if you need to manually rotate an image, you can do so using the Rotate menu command.

Figure 3-11. Sometimes you need to rotate an image manually.

To manually rotate an image, follow these steps:

You can use the Main dial or the left and right arrow buttons to navigate to other images and rotate them. When you’re done rotating, press the shutter button halfway to exit playback mode. Your image editor may or may not show these images with your chosen rotation.

The XS can automatically play a slideshow of the images on its card.

To start a slideshow, follow these steps:

If your camera is set to show an image review (a quick view of your image immediately after you shoot), you can delete the image when it appears on your screen.

To delete an image during image review, follow these steps:

When in playback mode, you can delete an image simply by pressing the Delete button, just as you do during image review. As in Image Review, the camera will give you one chance to cancel the operation. If you choose Erase, it will delete the image.

If you want to erase lots of images, follow these steps:

The camera will give you a chance to cancel. Select and press OK to delete the checked images.

Normally, you’ll erase a card only after you’ve transferred its contents to your computer. However, sometimes you might need to erase an entire card in the field. Perhaps you realize you’ve been shooting for the last hour with manual settings that have grossly overexposed all your images. Or maybe you forgot to erase the card when you last transferred images to it and it’s full of old pictures.

In the Erase images menu that you saw in the previous section, there was an option to called Erase All Images. While this works, it’s not the best way to erase the card. A much better option is to choose Format from the tools menu 1.

Figure 3-14. Choosing Format rather than Erase All Images means there’s a much better chance your card will be readable in your computer later.