Tulip Wall
Photography Basics: How to Understand Aperture
Aperture and other photo basics can induce yawns in the most eager of new shutterbugs, but once these basics are understood, the rest of photography comes easily into focus. Aperture, shutter speed and ISO are all terms good to know, whether you have a point-and-shoot or professional camera. This article explains the basics of aperture and provides tips on how to use it to take better pictures that you'll be proud to display on your wall in a hanging picture frame.
To better understand aperture, think about how the irises of your eyes get bigger and smaller to allow more or less light into the pupil. Like your irises, the camera's lens diaphragm widens and narrows to let in more or less light. Thus, the aperture dictates the exposure (the darkness or brightness) of the photo. The aperture also has another important function which we'll look at shortly.
"Aperture" refers to the size of the camera's lens diaphragm and is measured in F stops. The smaller the F stop, the wider the aperture. This is why it can be confusing. Actually the F stop numbers represent ratios, which is why the larger the F stop number, the smaller the aperture.
Besides controlling light, aperture controls depth of field. To better understand this concept, make a fist and hold it in front of your eye. Now gradually open your hand. See how the focus changes? Sure you can see more through the larger opening, but notice how when the opening in your fist was small, everything that you could see was equally in focus? Try it again and see how when you open your fist, the object closest to you will come into focus while objects further away will be fuzzy. This is how aperture determines depth of field or how much of a picture is in focus.
If you are shooting in Auto Focus (AF), the camera will attempt to focus on what it perceives to be the main subject of the photograph, but the results may not be what you want.
For this reason, many cameras have an Aperture Priority setting to help eliminate this problem. This allows you to set the aperture and then it automatically adjusts the shutter speed to compensate for the aperture. For example, if you set the aperture for a landscape, it narrows it and therefore lets in less light. The camera would automatically lengthen the time the shutter stays open so that your photo isn't underexposed (too dark). Aperture Priority isn't perfect, but generally this how it works.
Now if you have an SLR and are taking pictures in manual mode, you can adjust the shutter speeds and aperture separately.
Most will have a camera with preset modes such as landscape, sports or portrait. When the mode is set for landscape, the aperture automatically narrows so everything will be brought into focus. At the same time, the shutter speed automatically slows, thus leaving the shutter open longer to compensate for the lessened amount of light streaming through the diaphragm.
When you switch to portrait mode and focus on a person in front of you with the landscape in the background, the camera will bring your subject into focus, making the person stand out more than the landscape. And it will speed up the shutter speed so the photo isn't overexposed by the extra light allowed in with the larger aperture.
Remember: the smaller the aperture, the greater the F stop number (because it represents a ratio not a whole number) and the greater the depth of field.
Understanding photography basics like aperture is not only important for those using manual settings or Aperture Priority, it also helps those using preset modes. Here are three preset modes you should better understand:
- Portrait: How much the background blurs when using this mode depends on your camera and the distance between your subject and background a minimum of 10 feet works best. This mode can be used for any subject you want to bring into focus while taking the background out of focus.
- Landscape:(called "Infinity" on some cameras): This is the mode depicted by the mountain peak or figure 8. You can use this for anything where you want everything in the picture to be in focus, such as seascapes, cityscapes or your garden. And for shots of breathtaking vistas, try framing them in a panoramic picture frame to make your images really stand out.
- Macro: This mode, depicted by the tulip, opens the camera's aperture extra wide so that you can take extreme closeups without the blur caused by not enough focus. Depending upon your camera, you should be able to get anywhere between an inch to a foot of your subject. When preparing to take photos outdoors of items like flowers, remember that even the smallest petal movement can cause the image to be blurry because of the slower shutter speed. Also remember to focus on the part of the subject that you want most in focus, whether it be a butterfly's wing or a caterpillar's eyes.
Just applying this knowledge can help you take some beautiful photos that you'll be proud to hang in a gallery picture frame on the wall.
Judy LewLoose 100 Tulip Bulbs on the Wall
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