Photography - Tips and Tricks for Beginners

Let's start with a few basic abbreviations and definitions that every photography enthusiast must know.

1. SLR - Single Lens Reflex.

2. DSLR - Digital Single Lens Reflex.

3. ISO - International Standards Organisation; a group that standardizes the relative speed of sensors. A higher ISO number indicates greater light sensitivity.

4. JPEG - Joint Photographic Experts Group. A type of graphics file format that is often used for compressing large image files.

5. RGB - Red, Green, Blue. The colour components or channels of a digital image.

6. TIFF - Tagged Image File Format. An uncompressed file format.

7. Sharpness - The rendition of edges or tonal borders.

8. Panorama - A series of images that are overlapped so that they may be stitched together to make a very wide angle of view.

9. Tones - The range of brightness values from dark to light that make up the recorded image, and may not match the original brightness values in the scene.

It is a not a joke to be a good photographer. Most of the times we only have one shot available at the object under consideration. For example - at any sports event, while shooting lightning, or kids. When we are photographing kids, we have to do it in one shot. We have to be ready for the serendipity that kids do.

In such cases we need to be very accurate and highly aware of our surroundings, our camera, and the amount of light available. Hence, exposure of the lens to the light is very important. We can also alter or fix our photograph in Photoshop later but all exposure problems cannot be fixed in Photoshop.

There are mainly two parts that govern the amount of light coming through the lens-

1. The Aperture - The diameter of the opening in the lens. It is called "f" number.

2. Shutter Speed - The amount of time the shutter remains open. It is described as fraction of second or a full second.

Exposure is the amount of light that enters the lens and strikes the sensor. It is a combination of intensity and duration of light.

When a photo is taken from the camera, the click creates an electric signal that a digital binary code of the image. This signal also contains colour information - Red, Green, and Blue.

Both the aperture and the shutter speed go hand in hand with each other. A narrower aperture results in a slower shutter speed, while a wider aperture causes a faster shutter speed.

Equivalent Exposure -

This concept relies on same amount of light for the proper exposure but juggles the aperture and shutter speed settings to yield different image effects.

Shutter Speed -
It is the duration of time in which the light is allowed to strike the sensor.

Fast shutter speed is used to capture fast moving objects. The camera can freeze motion in ways the eye cannot. The fast shutter speeds possible is 1/8000 sec up to 8 fps.

Slow shutter speeds are useful when shooting with flash as it allows slow synchronisation. 1/30 sec is slow because it is probably the slowest speed at which most people can hold a camera without blur.

For steady images go for 1/125 sec to 1/500 sec.

F-stop or Aperture Settings -

It is the opening of a lens, the size of which is controlled by a diaphragm. It is used to designate f-stops or f/stops, such as f/4. The wider is the opening, the smaller is the f/number.

It works with stops that are variable between the maximum (widest) and minimum (narrowest) opening the lens offers.

Higher aperture numbers represent the narrower opening. Aperture f/4 is a wider lens than f/16.

Aperture also plays a critical part in the depiction of sharpness through the picture space, or the visual relationship of near-to-far subjects. This is also known as depth of a field.

A narrower aperture will yield more sharpness throughout the space. A wider aperture will yield less range of sharpness from near-to-far.

You can use wide angle lens and narrow apertures in combination to deliver a zone of sharpness, or depth of field that cannot be seen by the unaided eye.

When depth of a field is the primary image effect you want then choose a narrow aperture and as short a focal length lens as possible.

ISO or Light Sensitivity -

It defines how sensitive the sensor is to light.

ISO 100 is the lowest value in most digital camera systems.

When the light gets low and the shutter speed gets slow it is a good idea to ensure a steady shot by using a high ISO setting.

There are a few occasions when flash is not allowed or would ruin the character of the shot. That's when high ISO comes into play.

Use high ISO for more light sensitivity (for faster shutter speed or narrower aperture). Use lower ISO for less light sensitivity (for slower shutter speed or wider aperture).

Lower ISO settings yield better image quality. Higher ISO adds more noise to the image.