Aperture, F-Stops and Depth of Field

Hello Again! Today, I have an article on Aperture, to finish the first three major segments in the "Camera Settings" series!

First of all, Aperture is measured in f-stops, shown like this:  f/3.5    f/6.5  f/22 ect.

 The aperture controls the diameter of the lens opening (shown above), the higher the number, the smaller the opening. This controls how much light is let in through the lens, and onto the sensor of the camera, so a smaller number (or a "faster aperture" as it is sometimes called) like f/2.8 will mean there is a very big opening on the lens, this lets in a lot of light you have to compensate for this by lowering your ISO or Shutter speed, and a bigger number (or "slower aperture") like f/24 will mean there is a very small opening, so very little light will be let onto the sensor, and you will need to use a higher shutter speed or ISO.


Here's my aperture scale, showing how aperture effects light in your photo!All photos are at an ISO of 200 a Shutter speed of 1/10th, the aperture is underneath each photo

f/3.5

f/6.3

f/11

f/18

f/22

As you can see, when getting to slower apertures, the photo becomes very dark, and you can barely see anything, so use your ISO and Shutter speed accordingly, so the photo is better exposed.

Another thing the aperture affects is the depth of field, or the DOF as it is sometimes known. The depth of field is how much of a photo if in focus, and how much is out of focus. If you can see every thing in focus, then there is a very large depth of field, if the photo has a lot of background blur, and only a small part of the photo is in focus, than there is a very shallow depth of field.

Here's a depth of field to aperture comparison, I've changed the shutter speed on all of them though, so you can see the photo clearly. ISO on all of them are at 200.

Aperture - f/5.6  Shutter Speed -1/15

Aperture - f/16  Shutter Speed - 1/2 

Aperture - f/22  Shutter speed - 2/1

As you can see, the higher the aperture, the shallower the depth of field. If you want to get a lot of background blur, use a fast aperture! Another tip for lots of background blur, is zoom in, it will give more blur! (I don't know why, but that's what happens!)


So there you go, The big three, Aperture, ISO, and Shutter Speed all covered! I'll be back with more camera settings and what they do, soon! Thanks for reading, and Happy Photographing!

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ISO Setting/Film Speed

Hello! Today I'm going to talk about ISO, as it is known on digital cameras, or film speed, what it used to be called back in the days of 35mm film cameras. Hopefully after this article you can control your camera a little more manually, and take the next step in mastering your tool of work!

ISO or film speed is practically the sensitivity of your sensor or film to the light. The higher your ISO, the more sensitive the sensor or the film will be to light! On a digital camera, you can change this setting quite easily by going through the menus (find exactly how too in your specific camera manual), however on a film camera, the film speed is on the film you buy, so if you buy ISO 400 film, you've got a Film Speed of 400 until you switch to a new roll of film, with a different ISO.

ISO numbers go up in a rather standard order, starting with the lowest number, the ISO setting that gives the lowest sensitivity to light, here is a typical scale; 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, 3200, 6400.  This scale is the most common, but you can get odd numbers, the main thing to remember is 100 gives a very low sensitivity to light, 6400 would give you a very high sensitivity to light. These numbers, on more modern, higher end cameras have been extended, like the new Nikon D4, the peak of tech at the moment, has an expandable ISO of 50-204,800.  That is one crazy range, and it's only going to get better as technology progresses.

Well if you can change a sensors sensitivity, why can't we use a really high ISO and take photos in the dark, without having to increase our shutter speed? Grain, Or noise as it is known on a digital camera. The higher your ISO, the more grain you will get, for example, look at this shot, taken at 6400 with no noise reduction;

Now this is a particularly bad example of lots of noise, because my camera is known for bad high ISO performance, but if you go to an ISO of 1600 or more, you are going to start noticing image compromising noise, so look out for it when taking a photo.

So, for my conclusion, here is my ISO scale, All these photos were taken at an F-stop of f/5.6 and an exposure time of 1/10th of a second, with the ISO used under each photo.

ISO 100

ISO 200

ISO 400

ISO 800

ISO 1600

So that's all for today, the last tip I can give you, is experiment with your ISO, sometimes, noise/grain is desirable, such as in certain black and white images, or giving an image that "retro" feel.

Anything else you want to know? have any ideas or suggestions? Knock em down below, and as always, Happy photographing!

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Smart Cameras - Opening the possibilities

I'm not a huge fan of point and shoots. They are nice and compact, but in my opinion, they are just not cut out for what I need them for, but this new range of Samsung Smart Cameras caught my eye, for more reasons than one, and the main one? Wi-fi capability.

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