Photography Basics

This is the scary one, but well worth playing with as it will help you understand what changing various settings do.

In manual mode you have to set the aperture setting yourself and you have to set the shutter speed setting yourself. If the resulting exposure is wrong, then you are to blame, if it’s right then that’s a feather in your cap and you deserve a pat on the back.

So how do you know what are the right settings? That’s when experience comes in, and it is not something that can be learnt quickly. Experienced photographers will know that on a sunny day, with the camera set to an aperture of f8, that a certain shutter speed will generally give them a decent result but as there are so many variables to think about, it is a tricky thing to do. Luckily with digital you can experiment as much as you want without worrying about wasting film and money on learning and making mistakes.

As manual mode involves setting two parameters, it takes that bit longer to set the shot up, so if a quick shot is what’s required then a mode like aperture priority or shutter priority might be the better option so you can concentrate more on getting the picture rather than worrying about settings.

On the other hand, if you have the time to set the shot up then using manual mode will teach you the most. Set the aperture and shutter speed, take a picture, review it and see if it looks ok. If it’s under exposed (too dark) then you might need to slow the shutter speed down a bit or maybe use a wider (smaller) aperture setting. If it’s over exposed (too light) then you will need to do the opposite, speed up the shutter speed or reduce the size of the aperture by choosing a larger aperture value.

I don’t want to dwell on manual mode too much at the moment, it’s a bit like running before you can walk, but I thought it needed to be mentioned. Don’t be scared of it, just remember that it needs a lot more thought and experience to get right.

These last few weeks, since having an operation, I was hoping to get loads of useful info on this site and really get it going, but as usual life just got in the way. My freelance web development work suddenly got busy and the sun came out too.

The good thing is that I have been making sure I got out and about taking lots of pictures to help demonstrate some of the things I have already talked about on this site, plus I have some photos ready for future articles which again will help demonstrate the points I am trying to make. I have several articles in ‘production’ that just need a few things finished off before they can be published so we should be back to regular updates soon.

I want to make sure when I write information that I don’t confuse people, and hopefully so far I haven’t done that. Example photos are the key to this, so it’s been good to actually take some pictures, and good that I know I will be able to explain some key aspects of photography clearly.

I have also been spending a little and have bought 2 new lenses, plus a set of extension tubes for my Sony Alpha 100 DSLR. This brings me up to an almost complete kit bag with only a decent flash, a tripod and maybe one more lens to complete my set up. OK, so it’ll never be complete, but it’ll give me everything I will need to satisfy a wide range of photography styles. I just need to resist buying too much more!

What I hope to do is to review the kit I use, not so much from a technical point of view, but from a photographer point of view taking into consideration cost, build quality and results plus anything else that applies to that particular piece of equipment. So that’s still to come once I’ve got more of the basics posted.

An online photography course is also planned later in the year. This will take the form of a weekly email giving you tips and information about a particular subject, and a task. Your photos for each task can then be uploaded and reviewed giving you advice on ways you could have improved your picture, or ways you could have done things differently.

As the web site grows, hopefully in popularity too, I will try and get guest articles by photographers giving their views and advice for beginners and those of you considering digital photography as a hobby or maybe a career move.

So, lots of big plans. Each will take some time to plan to make sure it is executed in the best way so you, the reader, get the most benefit from it, but rest assured, this site won’t be left to gather dust.

Here is an example of how shutter speed can be used creatively. The subject of these two shots is the same, the position is the same but the images look quite different.

You can see that the image on the left shows the water drops more clearly. This was taken with a fast shutter speed, so the action gets frozen and the detail is sharper.

The image on the right uses a slow shutter speed. When this image was taken, the shutter was open long enough for the water to move a distance which gives the more blurred and smooth effect.

Both shots have the good points, but both are interesting in how they show the detail. Water is a great way to experiment with different shutter speed settings as you can see the effects very easily. It’s worth remembering that with a slower shutter speed, the problem of camera movement becomes more apparent. A tripod, beanbag or supporting the camera on a wall or solid object should be used stop camera shake ruining the image.

Writer’s have it so why can’t photographers? When you are new to photography, or have just bought a fancy new camera, there comes a point when you think “I want to do some photography, but I just don’t know what to take pictures of!”. Maybe the weather is rubbish, maybe you have some time off work or school, but you just can’t get inspiration. So what do you do?

Well, for me, I look at other people’s work to see how other people view different things. I usually do this on the internet, or sometimes I thumb through several photography books I have. Web sites are easiest though as there are so many of them. Being a Flickr user, I use the “Last 7 Days of Interestingness” and see what photos have been popular. Photo communities like Photo.net are also good to see what other people have been doing photographically too.

Another thing to do is set yourself a challenge. Choose a theme, make it simple, and make yourself take a series of pictures. Themes can be as simple as “The Number 2″, “The Colour Blue” or “Circles”. This keeps it very broad but gives you enough focus (no pun intended) to think about your images. Try and make each image very different, ok some may not be successful, but you learn more from mistakes and you will start to train your eye to be creative in what you are looking at.

Another challenge to set yourself is to take one everyday object and get 10 different images of it. Use different camera settings, different lighting, different angles and different viewpoints but try and make every picture unique.

This is a simple tip and it’s that you should carry your camera around with you whenever you can.

Even it’s just your mobile phone camera, you’ve got a means to record an event. OK, you may not get the best picture, but you can capture a moment that may be important to you, or an unusual event.

This picture is one I managed to get using my DLSR and a 70-210mm lens set at 210mm. The conditions weren’t good, very overcast and the smoke from the fire added to the poor visibility.

As my DSLR has 10 Megapixels it enables you to crop (cut off) a lot of the image and still retain a usable amount of quality. So using the same image and a tighter crop I ended up with a nicer composition that shows enough detail to tell the story of what was going on.

So because I had my camera (as did lots of other people gathering on the shore to watch) I was able to capture a record of an event with a reasonably pleasing result.

Having a small compact camera is great to just put in your pocket of you go out for a walk, or you go for a drive, just in case that moment comes along.

By the way, all six crew got off the boat safely with no injuries and the boat was left to burn all the fuel off and it finally sank an hour after I took these shots.

ISO is actually a common short name for the International Organisation for Standardization.

The ISO setting on your camera is something that has carried over from film. Remember back in the ‘old days’ when you used to go and buy your rolls of film and you would buy film rated at 100, 200 or 400, maybe even 800 or 1600? Well that number refers to the film’s sensitivity to light. The higher the number, the more sensitive to light the film is. The ISO bit is from the standards for film sensitivity, and the number refers to it’s rating.
So what does sensitivity mean? Well a low sensitivity means that the film has to be exposed to light for a longer period of time than a film with a high sensitivity in order to properly expose the image. With a lower sensitivity you also get a better quality image too which is why you should always try and use the lowest sensitivity you can get away with. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves though, a little more explanation is required.

You might remember buying film for a sunny holiday and the shop assistant would recommend using a film rated at 100 or 200. If, on the other hand, you were going to be taking pictures indoors, then you might be recommended a higher sensitivity like 400 or maybe 800. If you used ISO100 film and decided to take some pictures indoors, chances are you would need to use the flash, or your pictures would come out quite dark. This is because the film’s sensitivity is so low that the shutter would need to be open for a long time to let enough light in. Your camera may not have had the features to allow it to keep the shutter open for long enough, which is why you ended up with dark pictures.

This was one of the problems with film. Once you’d loaded it into your camera, you were pretty much stuck with that film sensitivity for 24 or 36 shots.

Bring on digital cameras and you can now change the ISO setting for each shot you take. That is one of the big advantages of digital photography.

So why do you only get choices like 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600 and maybe 3200 when it’s digital, surely you could set 154 or 958 if you wanted it? It’s only electrical currents and circuits after all, not a piece of film. Well, in theory you could choose any setting you wanted, but imagine how tricky that would be. There are three settings which combine to give you the exposure, these are Aperture, Shutter Speed and ISO. Each one can be changed individually to allow you to set then to what you think will give you the perfect exposure, or you can let the camera set them for you to what it thinks is the perfect exposure for the conditions it can detect. Already with three different options, each having several settings themselves, the combinations are numerous, so keeping ISO to set values, which people will understand makes it a little less confusing.

Now, I mentioned quality too, and that better quality images are achieved with a lower ISO number. If, again, you go back to film days you may remember the sort of grainy effect some images had. Well this grain effect is what is introduced with a higher sensitivity film. Digital has it’s own grain effect with higher sensitivity and is known as Noise. Digital noise can be seen a sort of speckley effect in areas of similar colour, like skies or dark shadow areas. It is a subject of much discussion and the camera is often judged on the amount of noise it produces at these higher sensitivities. This is why you should always try and keep your ISO set to the lowest number, and use aperture and shutter speed to get the right exposure. If you can’t do that with aperture or shutter speed, move up to the next ISO setting and try again.

Why is a high ISO setting needed? Well for indoor work, where flash isn’t allowed and the light levels are fairly low. Or you can use it deliberately to get the grainy gritty feel to the image (although I would prefer to add this later on the computer).

It’s well worth experimenting with ISO settings so you can see just how your camera performs at the various levels. Once you have got to grips with how changing Aperture, Shutter Speed and ISO effect your image, you’ve pretty much got all the technical fundamentals nailed.

Over at the Digital Photography School Blog there is a nice post on how to choose the right ISO setting which is worth checking out.

After some thought I decided to change the design of this site to something which I think is a little better on the eye. I also had a few tips from Vivien over at Inspiration Bit, which is a great blog for design tips with loads of useful links. She was kind enough to give an expert opinion, as well as point me to some great resources on the web. As colour choice and design isn’t one of my stronger skills it was a big help on choosing a more appropriate theme.

If you have any thoughts on my theme, please let me know. It’s actually based on Ocean Mist which caught my eye, and I’ve made a few alterations which suit my site a bit better. I’ve also used one of my own photos for the header too which I thought worked quite well.

Believe it or not, you can buy things cheaper from other internet stores then you can on ebay. OK, there are some bargains to be had, especially with photography equipment, but the common thought that everything is cheaper on ebay is not always true.

One great source of second hand camera gear is on photography related forums. Many photographers give the first offer to people who use their favourite forums and often the offer will be better than when they put their gear on ebay.

If you are thinking about buying a camera, it is well worth checking out the second hand market as other photographers are replacing their kit when they reach it’s limits, but it can be perfect for a beginner. With digital prices coming down all the time, a 1 year old camera will still have all the functionality you would need to learn photography, but will be a fraction of the price of a new camera.

Get closer to your subject.

Once you have taken a picture from the viewpoint that you think is right, try getting closer and taking it again. You can do this by physically walking, or running if you feel the need just don’t drop your camera, closer to the subject or using your zoom lens and zooming in on the subject.

This fills the frame with more detail from the shot rather than the wider view and can help pick out certain details more effectively.

Getting really close may give your image a more abstract look where patterns and shapes make the image instead of a recognisable object.

Shutter Priority is another partly manual mode that most digital cameras will allow you to use. Shutter Priority is usually indicated as an S or Tv on the camera and it allows you to set the shutter speed while the camera will control the aperture setting.

While aperture priority allows you to control the depth of field of your image, shutter priority allows you to control how motion of anything in the image is recorded. For example, for sports photograph, when you want to capture fast moving objects, using a fast shutter speed will help capture the action as sharply as possible. For landscape photography, on the other hand, you might want to use a longer shutter speed to create smooth looking water effects.  Fading light can also require a longer shutter speed when you want to continue using the same aperture.