Automatic Mode: Tells your camera to select shutter speed, aperture, ISO, white balance, focus and flash to take the best shot that it can. You have to keep in mind that you’re not telling your camera any extra information about the type of shot you’re taking so it does what it thinks you want.
Portrait Mode: Automatically selects a large aperture which keeps the background out of focus.
Works best when you are photographing a single subject and are close to the subject.
Macro Mode: Great for shooting small objects. Keep the camera and the object parallel or a lot of the photo will be out of focus.
Landscape Mode: Makes the camera have a small aperture so most of the photo will be in focus.
Consider a tripod to keep your camera still, because the camera might select a slower shutter speed to compensate for the smaller aperture.
Sports Mode: To photograph moving objects better such as sports, pets, cars, wildlife etc. This mode increases the shutter speed to make objects seem still.
Night Mode: For shooting in low light and sets camera to a longer shutter speed, and also uses the flash. Use a tripod if you do not want the background to be blurred.
Movie Mode: Records both video and sound. Quality is not as good as a video camera and takes more memory storage than images.
Aperture Priority Mode: Useful to control the depth of field in a shot. Choosing a large number aperture means the aperture is smaller so you’ll have a larger depth of field and the camera will choose slower shutter speed.
Shutter Priority Mode: Select a shutter sped and the camera will pick all the other settings. You want a fast shutter speed for sports or a slow speed to capture the motion of a subject like a waterfall.
Program Mode: Similar to Auto but gives more control to flash, white balance, ISO etc. Different cameras differ in Program mode and Automatic works.
Manual Mode: Gives you full control over every setting. You must know everything that you are doing or you shouldn’t use manual mode.