These days with the invention of cheap and easy to use digital cameras and smart phones every second of the day must be being recorded by some person or other in some time and space for a wide variety of motivations. People take pictures because they witness something that they want to remember, that’s a basic as it gets, and therefore every photo has a worth and value which may be personal or global. Photographs can depict beauty or violence, happiness or deep grief; they are moments experienced throughout our world and give an amazing ‘snapshot’ of current culture, desires and psychology. What do your photographs say about you? The great thing is that once you become aware of that camera, that pretty much everyone now has access to in their pockets, it encourages you to really look at things and appreciate aspects of life that you previously sped pass on the fast track of a busy schedule.
Because your subject is usually something that impacts you and speaks to you on some level, you will want to replicate that moment as effectively as possible. Here is some basic know how to help you on your way.
A camera has four basic functions that determine whether your image will be blurred, too bright or poor quality, these are: focus, ISO, Shutter speed and f-stops or aperture
Focus:
In most cameras in our technological times, focus is taken care of automatically for the photographer but you should practice focusing manually for more diverse shots. Focusing is something we do everyday without thought or conscious knowledge. Our eyes work in the same way as a camera. Our pupils dilate or contract to alter the amount of light hitting the sensors at the back of our eyes and automatically bend and flex to form an image.
When we focus using a camera lens we are adjusting the distance of the lens ever so slightly with regard to the subject of our photograph. The light from the scene passes through a lens which refracts and condenses the image onto digital sensors which record the information. If our lens is incorrectly positioned the light focuses at a point in front of or behind the sensors so they don’t receive the direct replication but a blurred facsimile.
When you half depress the shutter release on a SLR digital camera you can hear and see the lens moving until it is in focus and then you take the shot but learning to focus manually is essential as sometimes the subject of your photograph is not the what your camera’s brain perceives as important (the camera tends to focus on the closes point). If you what to take a picture of something in the distance, for example trying to focus on a bird through the branches of a tree when the leaves keep coming out in focus or if you want to highlight something on the edge of your composed picture that the camera is ignoring or even if you are shooting in low light conditions and your camera isn’t picking up enough detail to pick out an object to zoom in on then you have to switch to manual.
The easiest way to focus manually is to pick a spot on your subject and rotate your lens until the image is clear. In film cameras they often came with a broken circle in the middle of the viewfinder and you would find a straight line to concentrate on and turn the lens until the line was unbroken in the two parts of the circle.
Focusing on digital cameras is very delicate as there isn’t much movement in the lens and simply takes practice and trusting your eyes as you’re putting the camera between them and the image and you have to work to focus on what you want to see.
ISO:~
Refers to light sensitivity. The easiest way to explain most of this is with knowledge of film cameras so in a film loaded camera you can buy rolls of different ‘film speeds’ or ISOs. Images form on film by reacting to the silver halides on the negative. A low number and by low I mean 100 or 200 has small film grains that need a large amount of light to pass through the lens in order to react with it, whereas a high ISO (1600, 3200) has bigger grains that require less light to effect them. Now in a digital camera these are pixels (I think!) but if you image it like this. An impressionist painting is made up of thousands of dots so that when you stand back you see the complete image but up close it’s just spots of colour out of context with what shapes these spots form. The smaller the dots the more detailed the picture but the larger the dots the more ‘noisey’ the image, it’s less defined. The lower the ISO the more detail and information is carried on your camera (the image is broken into smaller dots). Will a high ISO your picture will look more grainy, you’ll be able to see more of the manufacture into which distracts from the full image.
So why bother having different film speeds? The ISO affects all the other functions of your camera. In bright conditions more light will pass through the lens then in darker settings and the image forms faster. This is ideal and you can shot at 100 or 200. but if it’s darker and you have your camera set to 100 your f-stop will be very low which cause a shallow depth of field (less aspects of your image are in focus) and the shutter will have to be open for longer to let in the enough light to gather all the information to reproduce your image. That means that moving objects definitely will be blurred and even static scenes are likely to be blurred because your hand has shaken slightly or the wind has blown you etc. In these situations increasing the ISO allows you to use a shorter shutter speed and/or a higher f-stop and will give you the best result you’re going to get without a tripod.
F-stops:~
F-stops refer to the size of the hole (aperture) that the light for your picture is passing through. The more light available the lower the ISO and shorter shutter speed is required BUT it’s like the big and small dots again, the more light coming in the less will be refracted and focused correctly so only the parts of your image that are the same distance away as your focal point will be crisp and clear, the rest blurred (out of focus). This can be advantageous if you are focusing on one aspect in particular like in portraiture photography where the background is unimportant or if you only want say an eye to be in focus and the rest of the face blurred so you have to consider how you want your final photograph to look when adjusting your settings and balance that with the fact that if you let in less light at once your shutter will have to be open for longer and if there isn’t much light to begin with you will have to use a higher ISO or your image will be dark and underexposed.
Shutter Speed:~
Does exactly what it says on the tin – it refers to the speed at which your shutter opens and closes to let in light. Obviously the longer it remains open the more light will be let in but long shutter speeds mean that movement will blur your image. With film cameras I was always taught that you shouldn’t shot at a shutter speed higher than the focal zoom on your camera lens, ie. Shooting with a wide angel of say times 35 magnification (x50 or 50mm is the standard for what your eye takes in directly in front of it) then you can shoot at 1/35seconds comfortably and if it’s a larger zoom lens of say x200 then you shouldn’t go longer than 1/200seconds. With a standard camera you should get clear photographs at around 1/60 or 1/125 or higher (shorter).
I know this all sounds very completed but it really isn’t and you’ll quickly get to learn what settings produce the best results especially now that you can check said results immediately with digital cameras.
Some examples:
Shooting outside on a sunny, regular day (ie not splitting out of the heavens or dark with cloud cover but just moderate)
ISO: 200 F-stop: 8 Shutter speed: 1/125 (approx)
Shooting inside in general will require a high ISO
ISO:800 F-Stop: 4 Shutter Speed: 1/60 (approx)
At night – Use a tripod!!! ISO: 400 F-stop: 8 Shutter speed: 5seconds (ish)
Don’t take these as a rule of thumb, they are just examples as conditions will be different with every photo.
This and other great articles are available at http://snaphappy.moonfruit.com/
My website:~ http://www.elwoodprints.com/
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