Posts Tagged ‘Aperture’

A prime lens is a lens with a single fixed focal length - it cannot be zoomed. Prime lenses appeal to photographers for a number of reasons. Depending on the lens, it might offer some combination of a large maximum aperture, small size, excellent build quality, better image quality, or lower price, compared to a zoom lens. In this article we'll look at some tips for using a prime lens, and how to deal with some potential issues you may come across.

Shooting in low light situations can cause a number of problems such as autofocus issues, high levels of image noise, and blurry photos. However, unless you resolve to only photograph outdoors when it's sunny, you'll sometimes have to shoot in low light and deal with these issues.

While these problems can be a pain, they can all be minimized to a certain extent, so you don't need to worry about them so much. There are a load of great photo opportunities that can only be had in low light situations (such as shooting at night), so it's worth learning the tricks for getting great photos in low light.

I've seen a few comments from some photographers stating that with the good high ISO performance from current cameras, there's no need to spend money on fast glass anymore. (If you're wondering what fast glass means, it means lenses with a large maximum aperture like f/1.4 or f/2.8, you can read more here: What does Lens Speed mean?)

In this article I want to take a look at this argument, and see if there is any truth in the statement.

If you have an interchangeable lens camera and you're interested in capturing photos that are more than simple snapshots, then there will likely come a time when you want to purchase a new lens for your camera. Although some photographers seem to always be obsessed with the latest and greatest camera bodies, in most cases a new lens will do much more for your photography than a camera body will.

The problem can come in choosing a lens - there are so many different lenses to choose from. Different focal lengths, zooms, and fixed focal length lenses, with and without image stabilization, and at many different price points. In this article I'll look at the different features you should consider when looking at a lens, and how to decide which lens is best for you.

A term that you might come across when reading photography articles or forums is that of Lens speed. This relates to all cameras, but you are particularly likely to see it used when lenses for interchangeable lens cameras are discussed.

Sometimes it may be mentioned that you need a fast lens, or that a certain lens is too slow. In this article we'll look at what lens speed means, and what makes a lens fast or slow.

Bokeh is a word used to describe the out of focus areas of a photo. It does not really mean how out of focus an area is, but rather how the out of focus areas are rendered.

A Cup of Bokeh, please? by Shermeee on flickr (licensed CC-BY)

You will find that some people are very particular about bokeh, while others aren't really bothered. Just like one person might love a particular photo, while another person might think it is nothing special, the bokeh characteristics of a photo can be quite subjective.

Camera lens reviews, particularly those in Japan, now often include photos with out of focus areas particularly so that viewers can judge the bokeh.

When you take a photo of a landscape, it's not too difficult to get everything from a few feet in front of you all the way to the horizon in focus. But as you get closer to your subject and the magnification level increases, the depth of field (amount of the image in focus) rapidly drops off.

In macro and close-up photography, depth of field is so narrow it is usually measured in millimeters. So taking photos where more than just a thin sliver of the image is in focus can be tricky.

The depth of field in this image covers just a small part of the butterfly's mustache

We've all seen beautiful photos where the subject is in focus but the background is blurred. These sorts of photos may seem difficult to create. But with an understanding of depth of field, you can make photos like this too.

In this article we'll look how you can achieve a shallow depth of field to create photos with a blurred background.

The Aggressive Black Drongo! by VinothChandar on flickr (licensed CC-BY)

Most digital cameras offer a range of shooting modes, going from M (Manual), through A or Av (Aperture priority), S or Tv (Shutter priority), to P (Program mode - automatic). In this article we'll look at the Aperture priority mode, and why you might want to use this mode on your camera.

Exposure in photography refers to how bright or dark an image is. An under-exposed photo is one that is dark, while an over-exposed photo is one that is bright.

Most people tend to use an auto exposure mode on the camera, where the camera works out the exposure for us. For example, the Aperture Priority, Shutter Priority, Program, Intelligent, and Scene modes. But even if you rely on an auto exposure mode, it is still helpful to have a good grounding in how exposure works, and how the different exposure settings work together.