There are a lot of different photographers and shooting styles out there, but one thing all photographers have in common, or at least should have in common, is to properly configure their cameras to best suit their shooting style, and by doing so, facilitate a smooth no-brainer operation while you're in-the-moment.

I have my way of setting it, and you have without doubt your way, I'll talk a little bit about here how I set my cameras.

This is Nikon specific, so it will mostly apply to Nikon shooters. I don't know Canon SLR menu system, but I guess some of the ideas can be ported over to Canon cameras as well.

I like buttons to push, so what I want to do is quick when I need it, without having to go into the menu system of the camera to get to the feature I want. One of the features I really like, is being able to quickly go into a 100% view of the image to check focus.

You can do that by going to the 'f Controls' menu, and set f1 Multi Selector Center Button to Zoom. Now when you take a picture, and while in review mode, you can press the center button on the multi selector to go into a 100% view at the spot where you placed your focus point. Press again and you're taken back to the previous view.

So what setting do I use for preview, well, I like to have it quick and easy, that means I have set my mode to view RGB histograms, and 'blinkies' for highlights are turned on, that means I get all the info I need, fast.

When shooting with flash, I often like to make some frames without flash, and to do that really quickly, I have assigned the DOF preview button to turn flash off.

Here is what you do, go to the 'f Controls' again, and under f5 Assign Preview Button, and set that option to Flash off.

What this gives you, is a really fast way of disabling your flash with a simple press of the preview button in the front of the D3, all while having your eye in the viewfinder. One press disables the flash, press again to enable the flash, nice and quick. Note that the flash must been 'On' for this to work. The DOF preview button only disables the flash from fireing, it does not physically turn it on or off, that must be done with the flash on/off button.

I have also done some custom settings for the way my camera uses focus. You can assign different ways on how focus is handled by the shutter release, or the 'AF ON' button on the back of the D3. I've set mine to use the shutter release, because I have more control using the shutter release button, It's a habit I guess, I'm too accustomed to using it.

This is just some of the settings I use for my cameras.

I just had to write something for my blog, so this is what I came up with on 'short notice'. More to come I guess, stay tuned.