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Now let me talk about the ISO. You probably have seen these numbers: 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, etc. in cameras. They measure how sensitive the image sensor in your camera can be. An image sensor is where the light is converted into an image. It is usually a small rectangle inside your digital camera. Your pictures exists thanks to this image sensor. The light that comes through the lenses is “printed”, “stamped”, “scanned”, or whatever you want to call […]

What Is Shutter Speed? We are talking about the three elements in the exposure triangle. We discussed aperture and now we will talk about shutter speed. As I just mentioned in the aperture section, shutter speed is the amount of time the shutter is open. Shutter speed is measured in seconds or fractions of seconds. And the bigger the denominator (the number below the fraction) the faster the shutter speed. For example 1/3000 is a lot faster than 1/30. Having […]

Let’s talk about aperture. Aperture Mode and What’s aperture? Lenses let light pass through an aperture. Look at the image below. On the left side you can see a narrow opening, in the middle you see a bigger opening while on the right side you see a complete wide opening.   The size of the aperture determines the quantity of light that will be present in your picture. When the aperture is really big, a lot of light is coming in through the lens and […]

We talked about how important light is. But depending on your camera, you also have other tools to affect how your pictures will turn out. Let’s talk about exposure. In general and rough terms, think of exposure as the quantity of light in a picture. A very dark picture has low exposure and a bright picture has a high exposure. And notice that when I talk about exposure, I’m talking about your picture not the environment or the scene you […]

What is Color Temperature? What is White Balance? We will now talk about color temperature and something we use in our cameras called White Balance. But before that, what does color have to do with light? In case you didn’t know, color exists thanks to light. We already talked that light can have direction and intensity. Well, in a sense, light can also have certain color temperature that make things look the color they look. Learning how light works, how […]

Now let’s talk about light direction. Before taking a picture, try to identify where the light comes from. There are many sources of light such as the ones listed below. Sunlight Window light Open shade Reflectors /Translucent diffusers Artificial light Candle light Off camera flash On camera flash Video light Continuous fluorescent Black light LED Light travels from its source in the way of light beams. Some sources of light spread light beams everywhere and others are set in a […]

You should know that something called aperture and another one called Shutter Speed are closely related. Whatever you do with one, you can’t do it without the other. Aperture is the opening size in the lens to let light come in. A bigger aperture lets more light come in, and a smaller aperture lets less light come in. Aperture is measured in f-numbers, so you will find measurements like f-5.6, f-11, f-22, etc. The smaller the number the bigger the […]

Let’s start talking about degree of diffusion. Light can fall on your subject in different intensities. There is hard light, soft light, and anything in between. Hard Light Hard light or hard-contrast light produces hard-edged shadows. These shadows are sharp and clearly defined. These shadows bring dramatic effects and boldness; they give a strong definition of what’s in your picture. Hard light is about texture and contrast. Examples of hard lights are the sun, and camera flashes. With hard light […]

Now we are going to talk about the number one thing in photography: light. Light is fundamental in photography. There is not photography without light. Without light you simply have a black canvas. In fact, the word photography is the combination of two Greek word roots, one being φωτός (phōtos) which refers to “light” and γραφή (graphé), which is associated with “drawing”. So photography is something like “drawing with light”. In photography, it is common to see people looking for a […]

In addition to the modes you just learned. There are a few more that are in fact some sort of variation of automatic modes. If you want to be really serious into photography, you may probably want to skip these modes. As mentioned before, most DSLR cameras have their modes on a dial located on the top right. There are of course exceptions. And in a point-and-shoot camera you would probably have to use the menu and your LCD screen […]