Master Shutter Speed

Oh shutter speed and how I can manipulate you to control time. I feel like I have some power over the universe and the only thing that can stop me is a dead battery! Using shutter speed to your advantage can make you feel like a super hero, but it will actually allow you to control the speed your camera takes a picture. The faster or shorter the shutter speeds make it so less light will enter the camera to expose a picture. The slower or longer the shutter speeds, the longer the exposure is and the camera will allow more light in to expose the picture. If you’re taking pictures of your sons sporting event you will want a fast shutter speed if you want to have clear crisp pictures. This will effectively “freeze” the picture in time. It takes all the action in the picture and brings it into focus. On the other hand, if you want to blur the pictures you want to slow down the shutter speed. This will give you a time lapse style picture that can show motion. It can show the way the player was moving, or the way water was flowing. The blur effect can be intriguing and it can add some artistic expression to the pictures.

                I prefer the pictures with a faster shutter speed and clear crisp pictures. I find that I always go through and delete any pictures that became blurry where I had the shutter speed wrong. After this exercise however, I’m going to take a longer look at these pictures and really see what artistic expression I can get out of them. I had fun completing the exercise because I had access to my son’s soccer practices and games. It happens to be a perfect outlet to test shutter speed. I also enjoy nature photography and I always wanted to blur the water in my pictures. I didn’t get great shots this time around playing with my camera because the weather quickly went south. I will get back out to experiment more. I definitely learned how to manipulate the shutter speed and either freeze my pictures, or give them the essence of motion.

                I believe having a camera capable of fast shutter speeds in a burst shooting is necessary for sports, wildlife, and children. The speeds in which the three of these subjects move is incredible and you need to be shooting at a fast shutter speed to freeze their action. Now if you are shooting water, landscapes, portraits or still life you can afford to slow down your shutter speed and allow more light in to gain more detail and sharpness. Be prepared to mount the camera on a tripod however because the increased shutter time means the camera has to be shake free for the amount of time the shutter is open. Remember you want to boost the shutter speed to match the targets speed, or slow it down to blur your pictures and let more light into your camera.

Mastering Aperture

Let me start off by saying aperture rocks! I’ve taken classes before and I know how to use a camera but I’ve never really explored aperture before. Without really knowing what to expect I start shooting and I already love the shots I can create with just a few simple tweaks. I like how you can focus on one particular subject, and blur everything else completely or how you can make everything in the shot be in focus. You get great control over the amount of blur and detail by making the aperture larger of smaller. The larger aperture setting of around f1.8 creates a sharp, detailed main focus and a soft blurry background. However on the smaller aperture setting like f22, the picture comes out with everything in focus and with a high level of detail. One piece of advice I can hand out safely is if you’re shooting a picture with a low aperture (f10 or higher), I would suggest using a tripod and a wired shutter release. The exposure time can be much longer with lower apertures to allow all the extra light and detail in.

I’ve noticed this more now because I’ve always shot in the automatic modes before being that I was afraid to ruin shots by switching to manual modes. I know this is only the beginning but I already feel like I have a great start to learning my cameras manual modes. It’s highly exciting to go out and start shooting, and have my mind know what I want to do with the shot, and how to do it! I will now use my aperture settings to modify the amount of blur or detail in my pictures while I’m out shooting. As a bonus of being in the digital age, we can shoot pictures and check them right away and if needed make quick changes right in the field to test the results. If we were trying this back when film was being used, we would’ve needed to develop the film and then examine our pictures to see how they came out. Once we studied the pictures we could determine if there was any changes that would have helped the picture and then gone back to shoot the image again if possible. If not it would have been lost forever!

I believe any professional, hobbyist, or amateur could make great use of their camera's aperture settings. You can use it to only have a model in focus, or a flower, and have the rest of the picture be blurred. This makes the model or flower the main focus of the picture and keeps the viewer’s attention on the main subject. Aperture could also be used in landscape photography. A small aperture would help them capture an entire landscape with full detail and sharpness throughout the entire picture. You could also use it to creatively blur out sections of a picture while keeping an interesting subject in focus. The possibilities are endless, and I really think that anyone can use the aperture settings to their advantage. It can make for some very interesting shots and it can make you feel like a pro, at least for a little bit!

Here is a link to my series of pictures showing my knowledge of Aperture!

Mastering my Camera!

            Welcome to my Blog! I'm new to the blog world and I can honestly say I'm a little nervous that I'm going to do a horrible job! I've been into photography my entire life and I've always had a camera. I like taking pictures of random objects, nature/scenic/landscape, candid people, and macro photography. I'm trying to get more into portraits and events/wedding photography. I'm by no means a professional photographer but I do hope I'm a well-known and successful one someday! 

OK, enough about me though, lets discuss one of the tools I need to reach my goals. We are going to discuss my current camera, the Canon T1i/500d. The camera itself is a DSLR, and has many features of a professional camera. It’s a 15.1 megapixel camera and has the ability to shoot video in full 1080p. It has many of the features you would expect to find on a DSLR these days such as:  a built in flash, automatic and manual shooting modes, automatic sensor cleaning, 3” LCD screen, Digic 4 processor and a 9-point auto focus system. The camera can shoot at 3.4 frames per second and has an ISO range of 100-3200 or to 12800 when expanded.

The automatic modes in order on the camera are: Full Automatic mode, Portrait mode, Landscape mode, Close-up (Macro) mode, Sports mode, Night Portrait mode, Flash Off mode, and Movie Recording mode. All the automatic modes do exactly what they say they do and don’t let you change the settings. If in a hurry I use the automatic modes to quickly get into the shot and let the camera do most of the work. I actually use them the most because I don’t have a deep knowledge in digital photography yet!

The manual modes in order are: Creative Auto mode, Program AE, Tv (shutter-priority mode AE), Av (aperture-priority mode AE), Manual Exposure, and A-DEP (Automatic Depth of Field AE). These modes let you really get into the creative function of photography and from one mode to the next allow you to make a multitude of changes. This gives you greater control of the camera and all of its functions.

The camera is compatible with most EF/EFS lenses and most EOS accessories. I’ve been able to purchase many lenses on craiglist for the fraction of the cost online. It’s definitely worth checking out if you’re trying to find lenses that fit your shooting style. Another great function for beginners and movie lovers is the live view screen. This allows you to shoot without looking through the view finder but by using the cameras LCD screen. I also find it very helpful that the camera has e-TTL. This allows me to use a compatible flash that will work by automatically setting itself. I’m still learning so it’s a great tool being able to have a flash automatically set itself while I try to mess with manual settings.

I find the camera very comfortable to carry around and use. It’s very versatile and well built. I like that the camera is easy enough to take out of the box and begin shooting with right away with a minimal amount of learning. I would strongly recommend reading the manual however. The camera can do much more than what I knew it could do before I read the manual. If you want a good all-around DLSR that has the ability to shoot video and cannot afford a high priced professional camera, this one gives you the best bang for the buck.