Repeat after me: your camera does not take amazing pictures! YOU DO! Or at least you can learn to.
But seriously, wipe the dust off your fancy camera and don’t let it intimidate you any longer! By reading this guide, you’ll be able to start taking better pictures and finally start to feel like you can take creative control over the kind of photos you produce.
In this post you will learn the key fundamentals of your manual camera settings. We’re going back to basics baby!!
The 3 Fundamental Components
Let’s talk about the 3 fundamental components that you will need to understand in order to master your manual settings: Aperture, Shutter Speed and ISO.
When you set your camera to manual mode, you will need to understand how they each function and how they work together. So let’s dive in!
Aperture
Aperture is the opening and closing of your lens and It controls your depth of field. Which basically means how much of your photo will appear in focus.
Say you want to take a beautiful landscape picture; you will want to choose a SMALLER aperture setting. Choosing an aperture between f8 and f22 would allow you to capture the most detail, with every part of the shot appearing in focus.
On the contrary, if your aim is to capture a portrait of someone up close, you need to separate them from the background so the subject stands out. In this case you would choose a LARGER aperture setting. Somewhere between f1.2 and f4 will help you achieve a blurred background to make your subject the sole focus of the shot. This effect is called Bokeh.
Not only does aperture control depth of field, but it also controls how much light is going to be allowed to enter through the lens. The LARGER the aperture the MORE light you let in through your lens. The SMALLER the aperture, the less light you let in.
I know this can seem a bit backwards when you are first learning so please make sure that you download our awesome camera setting cheat cards here!
Shutter Speed
Think of the shutter as a sliding door that opens and closes at a specified speed. Imagine you are in a pitch-black room with a black sliding door that opens to reveal the bright light outside. When you open the door slowly you are letting the light leak in. When you open it quickly the light floods the room.
So how does this translate to the camera? Shutter speed allows you to control the amount of light that’s let into the image and allows you to determine how long that light exposure continues for.
The shutter speed works in conjunction with the aperture to determine the correct amount of light needed and length of exposure for a particular shot.
Not only does shutter speed control the amount of light exposure, but it also allows you to master control of shooting subjects in motion.
Let me explain. Say you want to take a picture of a car driving by. If you wanted to capture a clear shot of that car speeding by, you would choose a FAST shutter speed, anywhere from 125th and above will FREEZE MOTION. A fast shutter speed allows light to enter for a brief period of time.
Say you wanted to capture the motion of the car with that cool blurred effect of it speeding by, you would choose a shutter speed anywhere BELOW 100th/sec and this will SHOW MOTION. A slower shutter speed allows light to enter for a longer period of time.
ISO
I’m not going to bore you with the jargon of ISO because it really doesn’t matter. All that matters is that you understand that higher ISO means more light, but with more grittiness, which we call noise. Using a lower ISO will give you less light with smoother images.
In laymen’s terms, it basically means how much your camera can capture in low light. For example, if you have a higher ISO that means your camera will probably do well in low light conditions.
Why is this important? Because you want to be able to capture as much information in the image as possible before it starts to lose quality.
A camera with high ISO settings is particularly beneficial for photographers that shoot indoors, where there’s low light or for those shooting outdoors, close to the evening. In low light conditions you will want to choose a higher ISO. Just remember that when you use a higher ISO, there will be increased noise in your images.
Luckily, these days most digital cameras produce a good shot, even in low light.
If you are shooting outdoors in bight light you will want a lower ISO. This will produce smoother images with a lot less to no noise at all.
Here is a quick tip for ISO: If you are shooting outdoors in natural light, set your ISO between 100-400
When you are indoors or in super low light conditions set your ISO at 400 or above.
To Recap
Let’s see if I can simplify it even further for you!
Aperture, Shutter Speed, ISO, ALL play a part in controlling light.
Aperture controls depth of field. An aperture of f5.6 and below will achieve separation from the background and your subject, also referred to as bokeh. Great for portraits.
More depth of field will give you focus across the entire image. F8.0 and above will give you more detail in the image, great for landscapes.
Shutter Speed controls motion. 125th and above freezes motion. 100th and below shows motion, also referred to as dragging the shutter.
ISO can be adjusted to adapt to different lighting conditions; such as low light and bright light, or indoors and outdoors.
400 and above is great for low light, 400 and below is best for bright light.
Now that we’ve given you a solid foundation of digital photography basics, it’s time to go experiment, and allow yourself to get more creative with your digital camera on manual setting!
