Photography Jobs Online

There are plenty of different basics that come with photography to get the particular type of shot you are looking for. This blog post will cover the main settings that you should understand before going over the other fundamentals that you need to improve. 

Exposure

Photography exposure refers to the amount of brightness or darkness in your photo and essentially how much light was exposed in the final photograph. You can compare the lens of your camera to your eye in this case. When there is a lot of light exposed in your photo it will be bright and it will be dark if there is very-little to no light. When your camera is in portrait mode, there should be a setting available to adjust the exposure. But if you are in manual mode and adjust your Aperture, ISO and Shutter Speed, your photo’s exposure will depend on these fundamentals to determine if it is exposed correctly, underexposed (not enough light) or overexposed (too much light). 

Aperture 

Photography aperture is the setting that controls the amount of light entering the lens. The way it is measured (shown on camera) is by F-stops. The smaller the number (Ex. F2.8), the more light that will be allowed into the lens. The higher the number (Ex. F8), the less light will be let into the lens. Aperture also has an impact on focusing on a subject due to the depth of field effect created. A low F-stop will create a blurry background or surrounding, which is called a large depth-of-field. A higher F-stop is usually used for landscape or when you want a shallow depth-of-field to prevent any blurriness or bokeh. 

ISO

Photography ISO (International Organization for Standardization) determines the amount of light sensitivity in your camera’s sensor (Ex. ISO 100, 200, 300, etc.). When you use a high ISO (Ex. ISO 6400), this causes the image sensor to capture more light, but it will also result in producing noise or grain in your image (visual distortion). It is recommended to keep your ISO as low as you can, depending on your surroundings, to reduce noise and make your photo sharper. 

When you are outside, the sun is going to bring a lot of light to the image, so you should keep your ISO around 100 and adjust your Aperture and Shutter speed accordingly. Then you may need to increase it when you are indoors depending on lighting. 

Shutter Speed

Photography Shutter Speed is how long your shutter in the lens is left open to let in light. Typical settings are measured in fractions (Ex. 1/125, 1/250, etc.) and this will affect multiple aspects of the outcome of your photo. A higher fraction (Ex. 1/500) will capture the photo much quicker with low motion blur because you are making the shutter open then close at 1/500 of a second, but this will also let in less light because it is closing quicker. A low fraction (Ex. 1/60) will be slower with a higher chance of motion blur, but will let in more light because it is allowing the shutter to let in light for 1/60th of a second. 

Long exposure shots are usually achieved by setting your shutter speed longer (Ex. 5 seconds) to let in more light and capture more movement. It is recommended to use a tripod for this to keep the camera steady to capture your desired shot. You may have seen photos when people take street photos at night and the car lights create a trail in the image – this is achieved by long exposure.