[yukichon]

I have always enjoyed taking photos , especialy of all things in the Natural World . My pictures are ok but think i could improve them with a better camera so i bought a better one the other day . It has 8 million adjustments , 134 page manual and lots of stuff i dont understand .....please dont say 'read the manual' ....thats why this thread is here.
What im after is a laymans terms guide to some abbreviations and whether or not they are worth using and an example.....

ie. best setting for mving objects like a river
how to blur background
how to reduce glare
best for capturing a night sky or a screenshot in a darkroom

......i could ask forever ......so here are some phrases

AE , AF , MF , ISO ,Shutter Speed (high-low ..for what ) , Aperture ??

[johnaalex]

Wow - you don't want much do you?

best setting for mving objects like a river - Rivers don't move that quickly, but the water may move very quickly so a fast shutter speed is useful to freeze motion. Whereas a slower speed can have a rather nice effect.
how to blur background - I think here you are referring to effect known as "bokeh" where you have an item (quite often a portrait shot) in sharp focus but everything else out of focus. This is acheived by using a shallow depth of field which is done by have the lens set to its largest aperture (lowest f stop number).
how to reduce glare - use a lens shade and don't point the camera at the sun
best for capturing a night sky or a screenshot in a darkroom

[SomeVorn]

Cor: A brief introduction to modern photography more like!!

Ok blurring moving objects - its all about shutter speed. Shutter speed is the length of time the shutter is raised in order to allow light to reflect from your subject onto the camera sensor. Shutter speeds are represented by units of seconds. So 1 = 1 second exposure. 1/2 Means half a second exposure. 1/4 Means 1 quarter second. A slow shutter speed of anything between 1/8 of a second to 30 seconds will blur some movement. Slow shutter speeds also shows how shakey your hand is - so the most important tool for people who love slow shutter speeds (and most photographers would argue one of the most all round important tools anway) = Tripod.

Every doubling step of shutter speed - eg 1/125 to 1/250 is halving the amount of light that is allowed to enter the camera. Every halved step - from 1/64 to 1/32 doubles the amount of light entering the camera. (same applies to the very slow shutter speeds - 8 seconds allows double the light of 4 seconds etc)

On bright days you will need an ND filter for the to acheive slower shutter speeds - Neutral Density filters are sunglasses for your camera - reducing the amount of light entering your lens means you can get away with longer shutter speeds without over-exposing your image.

Blurring Background - This is down to aperture settings. The aperture consists of a series of blades towards the back of any lens - they close and open depending on whichever settings you want, Wide open apertures of (described as Fx.x) F1.4/F1.8/F2.0/F2.8 mean that you are letting a lot of light through the aperture and onto the sensor . It also means that Depth of field is significantly reduced. Depth of field is the distance is what you see when you look into your camera and see whatever is in focus. At 1.4 my thumb is in focus but my fingers aren't. At F8.0 - my thumb is in true focus but because the aperture has been stopped down and my fingers appear to be in focus (or 'sharp' as its more commonly known).

Similarly to shutter speed, every time your double your aperture eg 1.4 to 2.8, you are allowing half the light to enter the lens. Every time your halve the aperture (F16 to F8) you are doubling the amount of light.

On modes such as Aperture Priority and Shutter priority - you can see the camera making these decisions for you. Set shutter speed to 1/125th of a second when in shutter priority. Point the camera at the sky and then into a dark corner. The camera will change the aperture as it goes - the dark corner will be a low number of 2.8 etc (in order to allow more light into the lens and make the aperture wide) - and when you point it towards the sky the aperture will become anything from F11/F16/F22. It might not even be able to manage these two strengths of light and you might have to change your shutter speeds.

Now aperture/shutter speeds other member in this axis of photography is ISO. ISO (oddly enough it doesn't really have much meaning as an abbreviation) is the sensitivity of your camera sensor. ISO 100/200 is normally the base ISO. A lower ISO means that the sensor is relatively insensitive. Studio Professionals and landscape fans do their utmost to stay at these low ISO levels because they produce high quality images. Higher ISO levels such as 400, 800, 1600 will leave your images with unpleasant Noise in the darker areas and even on the more expensive models, potentially loss of detail in your images.

In the same way aperture and shutter speeds allow more/less light in as your half/double the settings - ISO 400 will be twice as sensitive to light as ISO 200. ISO 800 is twice as sensitive to light as ISO 400 etc.

So by now you should be seeing a pattern.

EG-A portrait of a man is perfectly exposed at ISO 400, 1/250th of a second at F8.0 - If I want to blur out the background some more, I need to lower the aperture number (but that means I'm OPENING the aperture, not closing it). I decided F2.0 is fine - but now I'm letting too much light in. So I have two choices
1) I can lower my ISO, making my sensor less sensitive to the light. If I divided F8.0 by two and by two again - I'm left with F2.0 - so if I divide my ISO (400/2 = 200/2 = 100) in the same way, I can guarantee I've have a perfectly exposed image but with different aperture settings.
2) I can increase shutter speed to compensate - but instead of halving my number like with ISO, I need to increase my shutter speed by doubling it. 1/250th of a second is doubled to 1/500th and again to 1/1000th. I can again guarantee that if the original settings produced a well exposed image, then these settings would yield the same results but with a more out of focus background.

Shutter Speed + ISO + Aperture = The secret to creative photography - understanding them will mean you'll be able to handle almost any situation.

Glare is what happens when the light hits the barrel of your lens and bounces around inside - very unpredictable. Avoid pointing it at direct light sources such as the sun and use a lens-hood if you have one. They ensure that the majority of light entering the lens is coming from whatever you are pointing the lens at. They also protect your front element of your lens from getting damaged. Flare can also be reduced by avoiding the use of cheap UV filters.

Night sky - Tripod - the above information should all help with that. The strength of light entering your camera is very low - so you'll need slower shutter speeds. Aperture will take a back seat here - apertures of F8.0 or F11 are excellent apertures for this situation - because depth of field isn't needed a specific requirement - you just need to make sure that there is a decent amount of it.
Think of F8 or F11 as "who cares" apertures.

AE - normally stands for auto exposure. AF - autofocus. MF - Manual Focus.

Hope this helped and that it isn't as confusing as Im worried it is.....

[Yandros]

Wow! Epic reply

A few more notes...

A good starting point is to put your camera in Aperture Priority mode and keep it there. Many of us pretty much use that mode exclusively anyway, so keeps things a little more simple for you.

As SomeVorn said, the aperture setting is the key to blurred backgrounds. However, with a kit lens, you may struggle to get the background out of focus as this needs a long lens and/or a very wide aperture, found on more expensive/specialist lenses. Assuming you have something like an 18-55 f3.5-f5.6 kit lens, try this...zoom to 55mm, keep the aperture at f5.6 (by using Aperture priority mode). Then focus on a close subject (say 1-2 feet away) and make sure your background is a good distance behind). You should get a pretty good blurry background.

[yukichon]

These are some brilliant brilliant replies which i am trying to undertsand but im obviously less knowledgeable than a 3 toed sloth ..... i shall keep reading it till it sinks into my pit for a brain


....i think i need to go back to basics and learn what the word apperture means etc.....

[johnaalex]

You might want to read this book Understanding Exposure: How to Shoot Great Photographs with a Film or Digital Camera: Amazon.co.uk: Bryan Peterson: Books

[Martin.D]

Understanding Exposure is perfect for explaining just that "exposure's" he goes in to great depth from the very basics to the advanced. Having read some of it my self "only came yesterday " I can already give you pointer's without being an advanced photographer but tbh your best bet is to buy such a book and learn from it.

Google is your friend...

Dont understand aperture
Watch this

[tdodd]

Try this - Ben's Newbie Guide to Digital SLR Photography - Canon Digital Photography Forums

[paulyoung666]

Originally Posted by yukichon

These are some brilliant brilliant replies which i am trying to undertsand but im obviously less knowledgeable than a 3 toed sloth ..... i shall keep reading it till it sinks into my pit for a brain


....i think i need to go back to basics and learn what the word apperture means etc.....

ok , what camera have you bought may be a good place to start , secondly , dont get blinded by numbers , thirdly , get out shooting , dont forget all its going to cost you is the money to recharge batteries , and finally dont underestimate the light , it plays very weird tricks with cameras

[yukichon]

Its one of these .... FinePix S5800 Zoom Digital Camera from Fujifilm UK

[Yandros]

Ok, strike out a few things that've been said, as we were assuming you had a DSLR.

You'll have a bit of a problem getting very blurred backgrounds, because one of the characteristics of your camera is a large 'depth of field' (ie the amount of stuff in focus in front/behind the subject. You can do it, but it's harder work.

[senu]

With respect, although the camera has all the settings on the dial, they tend not to be as effective as on a DSLR
I had a few Film SLRs before using a Fuju 602 . nice " bridge camera" but nowhere as easy to get creative with as the Canon 350D i bought to replace it
Your camera is actually far better than the 602 but when you then wish to get a bit more creative, it begins to get limiting as it is mainly aimed to " automate" as much as possible, which is great if you would rather not get " technical"
Nonetheless I rather like its stated specs
I think Fuji are being a little cunning by suggesting you can be creative without at least some " technical" know how though
As such while there are some very decent Non DSLRs out there, for the sorts of effects you are trying to get, I fear you will need to work very hard with the Fuji and be prepared to accept some limitations with it

[tdodd]

Here's an online book delivered as several .PDF chapters....

Photo 101 - 50 Fast Digital Camera Techniques

There are links to numerous tutorials here....

http://www.cameratown.com/guides/

and here....

http://www.adorama.com/catalog.tpl?op=academy

and here....

http://photo.net/learn/

and here....

http://www.photozone.de/Technique

and here....

http://tips.romanzolin.com/

and here....

http://digital-photography-school.com/how-to-photograph

[senu]

Excellent links
I imagine, a very valuable resource regardless of any kit limitations ( if that)
I just spent 30min browsing the last one: Amazing what you can still pick up

[gken74]

Originally Posted by tdodd

Try this - Ben's Newbie Guide to Digital SLR Photography - Canon Digital Photography Forums

Great Thanks!

And thanks Yuki as you saved me asking the same questions as I was just about to post a question on a Recommended Newbies guide as bought a Canon 400D in last year but don't have clue on how to do anything bar take pictures with the auto settings.

I'll have a read through these links

cheers
Gaz

[yukichon]

i really appreciate all the help and replies guys ....i know its not a great camera but its a lot better spec than my last and im sure with the advice and links ill get some great snaps ...better get practising

[Yandros]

Originally Posted by yukichon

i really appreciate all the help and replies guys ....i know its not a great camera but its a lot better spec than my last and im sure with the advice and links ill get some great snaps ...better get practising

No, actually it's a good camera. The only thing you need to be aware of is that the non-DSLRs have an inherent deep depth of field, because the sensor is smaller. This is actually a very good thing for macro work etc when you want things sharp, but a pain in the ass when trying for very blurred backgrounds