Manual shutter speed and aperture
“Smart” digital cameras are able to decide for themselves what settings to take this or that frame with; there is no need for the amateur photographer to think about the technical side of the matter. But if the scope of the automatic mode has become narrow for you, there is a desire to join the world of photography, it is time to learn the basics of photography theory. One of basic concepts is the exposure of the frame.
It is most simply explained: the aperture determines how much light will be transmitted in the camera and, accordingly, in the photo or image sensor. The wider it is, the more light it transmits. They determine how much aperture opens and how much light enters. It depends on how dark or bright your image will be.
In low light, you will need a lens with a wide enough aperture to insert more light into the lens. The aperture also controls focus, so if you are shooting groups of people in a pub, you should be careful how wide the aperture is, and not be half the people out of focus. This is the right time to use the flash, but my advice is to invest in a suitable external flash, it will make the world in photos completely different.
The exposure in photography is the amount of actinic radiation (human-visible spectrum + ultraviolet and infrared) that forms an image on a photosensitive element. It used to be a film, now it's a digital matrix. If the exposure is insufficient (underexposure), the frame will turn out too light, excessively (overexposure) - dark and even post-processing will not fix the flaws. And only with an optimally selected exposure, the image will have normal saturation and better elaboration of details both in the light and in the shadow.
Shutter speed is the second step that must be taken into account during exposure, since it affects the amount of light entering the camera — the higher the shutter speed, the less light it will get on film or sensor. If you are outdoors and aiming in low light, and you don’t have a tripod, be careful not to choose too slow speed or blurry images.
Our advice is to use the lowest possible sensitivity. Thus, your pictures will have better quality and less electronic noise. This is not recommended because it will damage your photos. When shooting a group of people in low light, it is best to use a flash.
Three factors determine the exposure: photosensitivity of the radiation receiver, aperture value and shutter speed. All digital cameras are able to automatically set these parameters, not always, by the way, accurately. Inexpensive cameras work only “on the machine”, and SLR and system cameras (mirrorless cameras with interchangeable lenses), advanced compact cameras enable the photographer to set these settings as he sees fit. We will tell you how to set the aperture and shutter speed in manual modes and what it may be for.
If you only have a built-in pop-up flash on your camera, this is probably not so good, but you can use some methods to enhance the images. If you do this, you will begin to lose background in the dark. If you are using an external flash, it is best to light from the wall or ceiling or use a diffuser to lighten the light. Often, when the flash is used correctly, someone without a lot of knowledge in the field of photography cannot even say that the flash is used: exactly the option you are looking for?
Photosensitivity - the degree of perception by film, and now the matrix of light radiation. Measured in ISO units and the higher it is, the less light is enough to create a correctly exposed image. However, with an increase in sensitivity, the number of noises degrading the image quality also increases. Therefore, in bright lighting, it is recommended to shoot at a minimum value that does not give distortion. On digital cameras, this is ISO 100 (less commonly, ISO 50). With a decrease in illumination, you have to increase the shutter speed, and if this is not enough, increase the photosensitivity, this measure is necessary. Advanced cameras allow you to take a signal even at ISO 200,000 and higher, which “film” photographers could not even dream about. This is almost complete darkness, but such opportunities have to pay a lot of interference. Their density depends on the type and quality of the matrix, but at values \u200b\u200babove ISO 600, noise becomes noticeable even on expensive equipment.
Here are some tips to consider when using the camera in low light conditions. If you are in a dark room and want your photo to capture the environment, the photo should be slightly underexposed. To get good pictures in low light, you need to keep an eye on digital noise. Keep your elbows attached to your body and do not lean forward. This will help to maintain a stable handset for a longer time, which will allow you to slow down the shutter speed.
The next few lines affect photographers with photographers with a retro camera. Honestly, it was not so long ago, when it was only a tape film, and not all of them had modern cameras filled with electronics. Turning also to electronics, this does not happen the moment you run out of batteries. Some cameras relied on electronics and a battery only for their indicator light, and when it stopped working, the camera could no longer continue to shoot. How to navigate in this case, when the light meter suddenly decided to go on vacation ?!
After the photosensitivity is automatically or manually set, it is necessary to determine the exposure pair: the optimal combination of aperture value and shutter speed. For normal exposure, it is enough that shutter speed / aperture ratioprovided enough light to get on the matrix to create an image of normal density. The automatic mode will perfectly cope with this task. But in advanced cameras, there are manual modes that allow you to set the priority of one of the exposure parameters. What opportunities do they give the photographer?
If you are not professionally filming a magazine, wedding or studio session, do you think you can carry a light meter with you? A light meter helps you measure speed and aperture to make the frame open properly. The rule is old, as confident in photography, but still extremely useful.
What is rule 16? Easy at first glance, exactly the same as a rule of speed when shooting with a hand that matches the lens that you have. In short, these are a few simple principles that will help you evaluate the exact effect depending on the lighting conditions and time without built-in light scattering.
Recall that decent cameras have exposure compensation, which makes it possible to introduce corrections that increase or decrease exposure. Why this is needed and how to use the function is a topic for another discussion.
Aperture - a device in the lens that restricts the penetration of light into the camera. At open aperture Depth of field of the image space (depth of field) is minimal, when closed - the maximum. Aperture priority mode allows you to flexibly control the depth of field. Portraits are usually shot so that the background is blurry. For this, the aperture must be open, and its numerical value f is minimal.
The most basic rule is a simple formula. The focal width of a color or black and white negative can make a difference. What is the situation with other aperture values? When changing one of the indicators, you should consider this and change the other values. Having made these changes, keep in mind that the relationship between speed and aperture is inversely proportional.
Here is an example to express it. On a quick table where these things are considered lighter. What happens if it is not a beautiful sunny day? Time is another variable that affects the image. Since the light is different in individual situations, this affects the settings that need to be set on the camera.
If not only the character is important, but also his surroundings, the aperture should be covered up to f / 5.6 or more, the depth of field will increase.
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Here we again show you a short table, these are the most common situations that are by no means exhaustive. What is useful to know rule 16, as well as other rules? First of all, even their basic knowledge allows you to be flexible in assessing whether to use them, or if you decide to break them down, in which direction and what the result will be.
Secondly, this is an easy way to determine how well your camera displays. There are cameras that are slightly underestimated, which is not a big drama, since shadows are more likely to receive information than overexposed photographs.
In subject photography, the foreground and background are also often taken out of the zone of sharpness, concentrating the viewer's attention on the main part of the plot.
In landscape photography, on the contrary, they strive to sharpen all the details, regardless of their removal from the camera. For this, the diaphragm opening is closed from f / 8 or more.
In addition, unlike the camera’s built-in measuring system, aperture rules are based on incident light instead of reflected light, which means that the brightness of the light is of paramount importance and not how it enters the lens and reflects. But the theme of reflected light and how to deal with it is really long.
So, for the moment we will stop here with these few helpers. The lens aperture - “diaphragm” or “iris” - is a brilliant invention of mechanical engineering, providing a variable size aperture that can be used to control the amount of light passing through the lens. Aperture and shutter speed are two main elements for controlling exposure: for shutter speed, lower illumination requires a larger aperture to allow more light to reach the plane of the image sensor, while brighter light requires a smaller aperture to achieve optimal exposure.
Recall that the shorter the focal length of the lens, the lesser the effect of the aperture on the depth of field.
Exposure is the length of time during which light hits the matrix, measured in fractions of a second, and for a value of less than one second, the numerator is not indicated. Accordingly, a shutter speed of 100 means that the radiation acts on the matrix for 1/100 of a second. When shooting static scenes in good lighting conditions, the shutter speed does not play a special role. But a photograph of dynamic scenes can turn out to be very spectacular if you put an exposure faster. For example, for a photo “with wiring”, it is recommended to choose a shutter speed of 1/60 or longer (the numerical value without the numerator is less, for example, 30 \u003d 1/30).
Alternatively, you can keep the same aperture setting and change the shutter speed to achieve similar results. But the size of the aperture provided by the aperture also determines how much the lens passing through the lens collimates, and this directly affects the depth of field, so you need to control both the aperture and shutter speed to create images that look the way you want.
This will ultimately lead to the use of a huge, inconvenient and very expensive lens, and therefore it is difficult to find very long telephoto lenses with very large maximum openings. The photographer really does not need to know what the actual diameter of the aperture is, but understanding this principle can help him. These numerical aperture values \u200b\u200brepresent whole stops, but you can also see fractional stops that correspond to half or one third of the total number of stops. Increasing the size of the aperture by one full stop increases twice as much light passing through the lens.
Salutes are also filmed at a very slow shutter speeds in a few tens of seconds.
And shots of the frozen motion, on the contrary, are done at short exposures.
Reducing the size of the aperture by one full stop reduces the amount of light that reaches the sensor by half. For shorter focal lengths, only moderate effective apertures are needed for sufficient brightness. Photographing concerts in the evenings or indoors is a particularly complex photographic discipline in technical terms. The reason is low light levels, a quick change of color lights, high contrast and the movement of actors on the stage. This is a diabolical mixture, but also the task of the photographer.
In this case, this is not so. Camera and lens options are critical. Singers, musicians and dancers move, so you need to choose a faster shutter speed. At this exposure time, low and irregularly lit scenes, an effective solution is to minimize the lens aperture. Very often, even a low aperture will not give you the correct exposure. If you need a large depth of field, that is, a greater degree of inclination, underexposure will be even more pronounced.
To remove the cork from a champagne bottle, the shutter speed should be ultrashort.
