Simple Camera Tips Series: Aperture explained!

Last week I introduced you to this series with helpful tips about natural light.  Today this tutorial will mainly be geared toward DSLR camera owners, but I do make some tips for point and shoot camera users at the end… so read on if your interested.  Now let’s begin!

Some terms we will be talking about today:

Aperture: this refers to the opening of the lens diaphragm where the light passes as you take your photos.

F-stop: Refers to the aperture setting in numbers like f/16.  The higher the number the less light that is able to pass through.

Depth of Field: Refers to how sharp or blurry the background behind the main subject is.   The higher the f-stop number the less blur there will be.

You may be scratching your head about now… I know that aperture was one of the hardest things for me to understand at the beginning.  Hopefully after this tutorial you will gain a better understanding of what it is and what it can do!

Begin to put the aperture setting into practice with these 5 easy steps… 

Step 1: This is where I tell you to turn off the AUTO mode on your camera and practice with the “Aperture Priority” mode on your camera (some point and shoots have this mode too).  In Aperture Priority it is usually set up to where you only need to control the aperture.  Once you have set the aperture then the camera will set the rest.   The aperture mode will take you one step closer to working in Manual mode!

Step 2: Follow the manufacturer of your camera’s directions on how to set your aperture.

Step 3: Pic a small object to photograph and set it somewhere far away from the background.  Try setting the camera at the highest f- stop number and take a pic.  What do you see.  Do you like that setting

Step 4: Now set the camera to the  lowest f number and take a pic.  Note the changes in appearance.

Step 5: Think of all the different pics you have seen and try to imagine which setting would look good with the different f-stops.  Practice a few around the house.  Don’t just stick to the highest and lowest numbers.

Step 6:  Practice photographing your subject close to the background and far away from the background.  Note the difference between the two.  The distance of your background will help determine the sharpness of the background… the closer the sharper.

As you can tell with the photos above the different aperture settings will help you achieve a different “feel” to your photos.  Portraits work really well with settings like f/ 2.8 where the person is in focus and everything around them seems to just fade away.  The lower f-stops are also great for up close or macro photography.  In landscape photography most people want to see the whole scene so you will probably want to set the aperture to a high number.   The main thing is just getting practice and seeing which settings that you like for your photos.

Some tips just for the point and shoot camera owners…

Tip 1: If you want to get more blur in your photographs try setting the subject as far away from any background as possible.

Tip 2:  If you have a zoom on your camera zoom as far in as you can on your subject to achieve more blur.

Tip 3:  If you have a macro or micro mode use this setting to achieve a blurred background when focusing on a subject up close.

The photo below was taken with a higher end point and shoot that had a macro mode.

Next week I will lead you through some more simple photography tips!

If you need more help with this tutorial  just send me a message and I will see what I can do.  I love helping people out and seeing them take amazing photos!  Just last week I had another blogger link up her pics that she took using natural light.  You can find that at  http://www.capturng.com/

Have fun and take lots of pics… Post a link to your pics in the comments section if you get to try this tutorial out!

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