Welcome back everybody! I took a few days off from my blog to attend to a photoshoot with a lovely young lady...for a really cool clubwear company. The project went very well, and the editing process is underway. But I'm glad to be back here, and ready to move another step towards our goal to have you shooting in "Manual Mode"! Here we go....
You've all heard the terms "f-stop" and "aperture" right? When I first started, I had no idea what either of those even meant! Remember how we talked about the human eye? OK.... here goes.... For starters, f-stop and aperture are one in the same, more or less. The aperture that you have your lense set at is referred to as the f-stop. Aperture is much like the dialation of your pupil! When you're in the dark, your eyes automatically dialate very large. Why? To let in as much light as possible. In bright light, your pupils are very small to let less light in so you don't damage your optic nerve. Get the idea?
Wrap your head around this.... The larger your lense is dialated, the lower your f-stop is, and the smaller it is dialated the higher your f-stop is. Seems backwards I know, but for now just go with it. Here's a good example: When shooting indoors with average light and you don't want to use a flash, you need a very low f-stop! Somewhere between f/2.2 and f/3.5 are decent f-stop starting points for this scenario. Outdoors is quite different because there's tons of sunlight, so maybe around f/16 to f/22 are better choices.
There are however bi-products of your aperture settings that go beyond exposure. It's called "depth of field". The more advanced shooters are ready for this, but for the beginners.... don't worry, we will be doing an exercise that will help demonstrate this effect soon. When the f-stop is very low (big dialation), the differences in depth are far more exaggerated and things in front of the subject and behind the subject may become blurred! When the f-stop is very high (small dialation), there is much better chance to have everything in the picture in relative focus regardless of depth. Either technique can produce an awesome image... just depends on what you want from the shot.
That is quite enough to ponder and think about for now, as this is one of the more confusing subjects and most important! Your camera has a button probably on the back, and most likely labeled "AV". If you push it and hold it (in manual mode) and scroll the dial by the shutter button.... you will see this number go up and down on your screen depending on which way you scroll the dial. Most kit lenses will show a low f-stop of 3.5, and the high f-stop is variable. Also, on your selectian dial for picture taking (where the green rectangle is) there is a setting labeled "AV". This is aperture priority mode. We will get into that soon enough. For now, just pound the info into your head so you are at least fimiliar with the terms and general effects.
That's your lesson for today, and be sure to check in tomorrow for another tid bit ;)
~Tommy Post
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