20d programming help please

First, thanks for the help.

Recently upgraded from point and shoot digital to D20. Have 18 - 55 IS and 75 - 300 IS USM lenses.

Taking a trip to Grand Canyon, Zion, Antelope Canyon and Sedona (daylight hot air balloon ride over red rock country) and want to program camera to fully capture the reds and browns in the landscapes out there.

Need suggestions for color temp and for paramater settings so that I can customize a program instead of using landscape presets.

I plan on using a circular polarizer to cut glare. Would a lens hood be recommended? Any other suggestions are welcome.

Will also be visitng Alaska later in year. Same questions for program for that trip. Colors are a lot more green, some water, some ice at glaciers. Can have lots of gey skies there in August.

Thanks again.

one more question - which flash would you recommend. looking at Canon 540 EZ or 380 EX. Most flash pics will be of kids at piano recitals, plays, etc.

Flash question first

for a Canon DSLR you need an EX series flash. The EZ series are for older film cameras and are not fully compatable with your camera

for the landscape shots, I virtually always have a lenshood mounted onto the lens. Also make sure both the lens and filter are clean

A polarising filter is very useful.

For colours, I would probably shoot in either P or Av and shoot raw files rather than jpegs. I would also keep the camera on auto white balance. You can adjust the colours when you convert from raw to tiff or jpeg

The only other thing to watch for would be your shutter speed, especially if your using the 75-300 and polarsing filter. You want to avoid camera shake. If necessary increase the ISO to 400 or even 800

thanks. hopefully the image stabilization feature on the 75 - 300 will help. I have never shot in raw and done conversion. Which editing programs are most user friendly?

Is there a big difference between ETTL -I and ETTL - II technology. Looking at some Sigma and older ex series that have ETTL - I ratings at much better prices.

Butterfly hood or regular round hood?

appreciate the help

I wouldn't worry too much about the shape of the lenshoog, just use whatever Canon supply

I use Canon's own software to covert the raw files; generally zoombrowser EX

Again don't worry too much about ETTL-1 & 2. It's a digital camera, if you're concerned about flash exposure, make test exposures and dial in any compensation if necessary

the best advice is go out and take lots of pictures and find what works for you