From the sunset picture example, you have learned the importance of taking full control over the exposure on your camera. Now, it’s time to dig into your camera and learn the three most basic tools available to you in controlling the exposure.
Those tools are shutter speed, aperture, and ISO. After I explain what each one does, I’ll explain why we need three separate tools to control the brightness or darkness of the photo.
Aperture
The aperture is a small set of blades in the lens that controls how much light will enter the camera. The blades create a octagonal shape that can be widened (we photogs call it shooting “wide open”), or closed down to a small hole. Obviously, if you shoot with the aperture wide open, then more light is allowed into the camera than if the aperture is closed down to only allow a tiny hole of light to enter the camera.
So suppose you take a picture that is too bright. How do you fix it? Simply choose a smaller aperture. Simple! Aperture sizes are measured by f-stops. A high f-stop like f-22 means that the aperture hole is quite small, and a low f-stop like f/3.5 means that the aperture is wide open.
Let’s test your knowledge to make sure you have it down. If you take a picture and it’s too dark at f/5.6, would you choose a lower f-stop number or a higher one? Yep! You’d choose a lower f-stop number, which opens up the aperture to let in more light. The size of the aperture controls more than the brightness or darkness of the picture, though.
The aperture also controls the depth-of-field. Depth-of-field is how much of the picture is sharp, and how much is blurry. If you want to take a picture of a person with a blurry background, you’d use shallow depth of field. If you want to take a picture of a sweeping mountain vista, you’d want to use a small aperture size (high f-stop number) so that the entire scene is in sharp focus. If you, like me, are more of a visual learner, then I think this graphic will help solidify the information about aperture. Take a minute and make sure you understand this info before moving on.
Shutter Speed
The shutter is a small “curtain” in the camera that quickly rolls over the image sensor (the digital version of film) and allows light to shine onto the imaging sensor for a fraction of a second. The longer the shutter allows light to shine onto the image sensor, the brighter the picture since more light is gathered. A darker picture is produced when the shutter moves very quickly and only allows light to touch the imaging sensor for a tiny fraction of a second. The duration that the shutter allows light onto the image sensor is called the shutter speed, and is measured in fractions of a second. So a shutter speed of 1/2 of a second will allow more light to touch the image sensor and will produce a brighter picture than a shutter speed of 1/200 of a second. So if you’re taking a picture and it is too dark, you could use a slower shutter speed to allow the camera to gather more light.
Just as the aperture affects the exposure as well as the depth-of field, the shutter affects more than just the exposure. The shutter speed is also principally responsible for controlling the amount of blur in a picture. If you think about it, it makes sense that the shutter speed controls how much blur is in the picture.
Imagine me sitting here at my computer desk waving to you (you don’t have to imagine very hard if you just look at the picture on the right). If you take a picture of me with a shutter speed of 1/30th of a second, then my hand will have moved in the time that the camera is recording the picture. To get rid of the blur, you need to increase the shutter speed to around 1/320th of a second. At this speed, my hand is still moving, but the camera takes the picture so fast that my hand travels only such a small distance that it is not noticeable in the picture.
The next question that most people ask is, how slow of a shutter speed can you use and still get a sharp picture? My blog post on Minimum Shutter Speeds will answer your question!
ISO
The funny thing about ISO is that it is an acronym, but nobody really knows what it stands for. It is always just called ISO even though it really stands for International Organization for Standardization. Every once in a while, you’ll hear an older photographer pronounce it “I-so”, but almost everyone pronounces it “I.S.O.” The ISO controls the exposure by using software in the camera to make it extra sensitive to light.
A high ISO such as ISO 1,600 will produce a brighter picture than a lower ISO such as ISO 100. The drawback to increasing the ISO is that it makes the picture noisier. Digital noise is apparent when a photo looks grainy. Have you ever taken a picture at night with your cell phone or your pocket camera, and noticed that it looks really grainy? That is because the camera tried to compensate for the dark scene by choosing a high ISO, which causes more grain.
What constitutes a “high” ISO is constantly changing. Camera companies are constantly improving the ability of cameras to use high ISOs without as much grain. A few years ago, only the highest-end pro DSLR cameras could achieve 2,000 ISO, and now even entry-level DSLR cameras can shoot at this level. Since each camera is different, you would do well to do a few tests with your camera to see how high of an ISO you can shoot at without making the image overly grainy.
Right now, you will commonly find new DSLRs that advertise expandable ISO ranges.
Putting It All Together
I know exactly what you’re thinking. “Why do I need three tools to control the exposure? Wouldn’t one suffice?” The answer is no, and I’ll explain why with an example. In January, I took a trip to my favorite place on the planet to take pictures–Yellowstone National Park. My guide informed us that the bighorn sheep in the park were dying off very quickly due to whooping cough, so I worked hard that week to capture pictures of the last few sheep in that area of the park.
Around 9AM on a cloudy day, I found a small group of bighorn sheep and started photographing them with a long 600mm lens. The early hour and clouded sky made the situation quite dark for shooting.
Let me help you out. The lens I was working with cost around $12,000, but don’t worry. You can get really good results with a much more affordable 600mm lens. I’m considering selling my expensive lens.
Anyway, it had a maximum aperture size of f/4. So I set my aperture at f/4 to gather as much light as possible. This also impacted the depth-of field to blur out the rocks behind the bighorn sheep. Next, I set my shutter speed. I wanted to capture action in the photo, so I set my camera to 1/1000th of a second shutter speed. I knew that this fast of a shutter speed would prevent any motion blur from the sheep running on the mountain side. Then, I took a picture. WAAAY too dark! I couldn’t compromise my shutter speed or aperture, so I knew I needed to use the third player in the exposure triangle–the ISO.
I played around with my ISO and found that if I increased it to ISO 640, it made the picture bright enough to take the picture without making it overly grainy. This combination of shutter speed, aperture, and ISO worked out perfectly. It feels so good to hone in the camera settings!
Now can you see why you need to know how to shutter, aperture, AND ISO, and know how to set them independently on your camera!
If you’re a visual learner and want to really learn your camera, then be sure to check out my Photography Start Course. Just a reminder, it’s a series of 22 videos where I take you on location to shoot waterfalls, landscapes, people, kids, and macro photos. You can look over my shoulder and see exactly how I set up my camera to take professional photos.
Now, you need to learn how to apply these settings on your camera to take advantage of your new-found nuggets of knowledge.
Superb website you have here but I was wondering if you knew of any user discussion forums that cover the same topics discussed in this article? I’d really love to be a part of community where I can get feed-back from other knowledgeable people that share the same interest. If you have any recommendations, please let me know. Cheers!
You could certainly see your enthusiasm within the work you write. The arena hopes for even more passionate writers like you who are not afraid to say how they believe. All the time follow your heart.
Hi there, You have performed an excellent job. I will definitely digg it and individually suggest to my friends. I’m confident they’ll be benefited from this site.
Thanks for the guidelines you have contributed here. Something else I would like to say is that personal computer memory specifications generally increase along with other advances in the engineering. For instance, when new generations of processor chips are brought to the market, there’s usually an equivalent increase in the dimensions preferences of all pc memory along with hard drive room. This is because the application operated by way of these processor chips will inevitably rise in power to make new technologies.
Undeniably imagine that that you said. Your favorite reason seemed to be on the internet the easiest thing to be aware of. I say to you, I definitely get annoyed at the same time as other people consider issues that they plainly don’t understand about. You managed to hit the nail upon the highest and defined out the whole thing without having side effect , people can take a signal. Will likely be back to get more. Thanks
Thank you for another great article. Where else could anybody get that type of information in such a perfect way of writing? I’ve a presentation next week, and I am on the look for such info.
Many thanks for this article. I would also like to state that it can be hard when you find yourself in school and merely starting out to establish a long credit history. There are many pupils who are just trying to survive and have an extended or beneficial credit history can often be a difficult point to have.
Heya i am for the first time here. I came across this board and I find It really useful & it helped me out a lot. I hope to give something back and help others like you helped me.
I think other website proprietors should take this site as an model, very clean and fantastic user genial style and design, let alone the content. You’re an expert in this topic!
Thank you for the good writeup. It in fact was a amusement account it. Look advanced to more added agreeable from you! However, how could we communicate?
I have seen that today, more and more people are attracted to video cameras and the field of taking pictures. However, as a photographer, you have to first expend so much time frame deciding the exact model of dslr camera to buy as well as moving out of store to store just so you might buy the least expensive camera of the brand you have decided to decide on. But it does not end there. You also have take into consideration whether you should buy a digital camera extended warranty. Thanks a bunch for the good recommendations I gathered from your website.
I appreciate, cause I found just what I was looking for. You’ve ended my 4 day long hunt! God Bless you man. Have a nice day. Bye
Would you be concerned about exchanging hyperlinks?
Thanks for expressing your ideas right here. The other thing is that any time a problem occurs with a pc motherboard, people today should not have some risk connected with repairing the item themselves for if it is not done right it can lead to irreparable damage to the entire laptop. It is usually safe just to approach any dealer of the laptop with the repair of that motherboard. They’ve technicians that have an know-how in dealing with laptop motherboard complications and can have the right analysis and accomplish repairs.
One thing is the fact that one of the most popular incentives for using your card is a cash-back or perhaps rebate present. Generally, you will get 1-5 back with various expenditures. Depending on the cards, you may get 1 back on most expenses, and 5 back again on purchases made in convenience stores, gas stations, grocery stores plus ‘member merchants’.
This site is really a walk-by for the entire information you needed about this and didn?t know who to ask. Glimpse right here, and also you?ll positively discover it.
Excellent website you have here but I was wanting to know if you knew of any discussion boards that cover the same topics discussed in this article? I’d really like to be a part of community where I can get comments from other experienced people that share the same interest. If you have any suggestions, please let me know. Many thanks!
I have seen loads of useful elements on your website about computers. However, I have got the thoughts and opinions that lap tops are still more or less not powerful enough to be a sensible choice if you normally do things that require plenty of power, such as video editing. But for world-wide-web surfing, microsoft word processing, and a lot other common computer functions they are just great, provided you don’t mind the tiny screen size. Thanks for sharing your ideas.
You actually make it seem so easy along with your presentation but I find this matter to be really something that I believe I’d never understand. It sort of feels too complicated and very broad for me. I am taking a look forward to your next publish, I will attempt to get the hang of it!
An added important component is that if you are a senior citizen, travel insurance pertaining to pensioners is something you must really think about. The mature you are, greater at risk you might be for making something terrible happen to you while in most foreign countries. If you are never covered by a number of comprehensive insurance policy, you could have several serious problems. Thanks for giving your hints on this web site.