How much do you know???

CC92713

CC92713

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Christian Elizabeth
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so I am at the point where i have learned just enough about photography to really confuse myself:lol: I am more into the artistic side of photographing but I realize how important the thecnical side is too. To those who are pros do you just have all of the settings for lighting and all of the other factors memorized or do you have to try a few different things to really get the pictures you want.... like i know the lower your appeture number(which really means bigger opening, right?) gives you a shallow dof how do you know how low to go for each Photo??? do you ever see what the cameras auto setting suggest and go from ther? sorry this is a very loaded question i just am a little overwhelmed... I just see so many things that i want to capture in photos I just cant always make it happen...yet;)
 
I picked up the technical aspects very quickly as I am a technical person and ISO, Aperture and so on seem very straightforward to me.

However, what I can't pick up is the artistic side (composition, interesting subject etc,.) and unfortunately that is a hole different skill/aptitude all together.

For what you are after it sounds like it would be best to get to spend some time with someone who knows the technical aspects. You can then explain what you are trying to acheive artistically while they can teach you how to get the result technically.
 
I was very very slow to learn how to use my camera.. loved taking pics and the ones my camera produced on sport mode where great.. didnt see the point in learning when the camera did it... however the more i did.. the more i realised i needed to be in control... It was a very slow hard process for me. it took a long time to get my head around apertures... hardest thing for me was.. the tutorials used words i couldnt understand :(

.. took a long time... but when it all came together and the penny dropped.. it was worth it..

I can now look at a scene and know what setting (iso, aperture, shutter speed) i need to get what i want.. sun or dark inside or out... it all came with the one biggest bit of advice i ever got in learing photography.... go take pictures ...and when you have... go take some more
 
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I went on a CityLit course, the tutor insisted everyone used Manual mode - you should've seen the look on some people's faces! However, it was a really useful opportunity to find out how shutter speed, aperture and iso affect your pictures. The great thing about digital is the settings you used are stored in the exif data. Unlike the few who had brought film cameras and had to write down their settings for each and every picture they took! Much of what you learn comes down to experience, so the more experience you get, the better (as long as you begin to understand the 'why' as well as the 'how')
 
I've owned my 450D for about 4 months I think. The first thing I did when I bought it was to stick it straight in manual mode. I don't think it's ever been out of M to be honest lol. Practice, practice, practice... Don't be afraid to play with settings and try to come up with different style, in the same composition!
 
Had my Nikon dslr for about a month now, last night the break-through finally came in understanding what the numbers on the lens 13.6-5.6 actually mean and how to set the camera in manual mode to those numbers using aperture, shutter speed and iso to achieve the right light balance, something I never thought I would get my head around and its all thanks to the advice iv read on T.P.

I had read the manual, but just could not understand what it was on about, the more I read the more confused I got. Ok its still a basic understanding, but I feel its real progress.
 
Mike that's great progess. It's true though, you can do as much of reading manuals as you want, but they are not as good as reading from some of the best photographers around, which you can find on this forum. Along with hands on practice, it's the perfect combination :)
 
I have a technical background so aperture, shutter and ISO make sense to me and I seem to think in aperture priority mode so that's mostly what I use. When I'm not using aperture priority I'll be using manual but mostly thinking about aperture :D

Scene modes are a complete mystery to me and verge on magic. I don't understand them and I feel confused by them so my cameras stay on the nice, safe, simple and easy to understand AP or M or occasionally but rarely shutter priority.
 
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CC92713 said:
do you ever see what the cameras auto setting suggest and go from ther?
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I started off by doing that - I looked at what the camera wanted to do, then thought about why and then pushed one of the settings to see what difference that made.

A good place to start is A mode as you can control the aperture and so depth of field and let the camera adjust shutter speed.

Its all a bit overwhelming at first - but the more you shoot the more you learn. And you learn as much from your mistakes as you do from the good photos - look back at both and think 'what settings did I use? What went wrong? Why is it too dark/light/soft/blurred? What could I have changed to make it better?' and the good ones - ask yourself why it did work and what you like about it.
 
ShoeQueen said:
I started off by doing that - I looked at what the camera wanted to do, then thought about why and then pushed one of the settings to see what difference that made.

A good place to start is A mode as you can control the aperture and so depth of field and let the camera adjust shutter speed.

Its all a bit overwhelming at first - but the more you shoot the more you learn. And you learn as much from your mistakes as you do from the good photos - look back at both and think 'what settings did I use? What went wrong? Why is it too dark/light/soft/blurred? What could I have changed to make it better?' and the good ones - ask yourself why it did work and what you like about it.
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Follow this advice and you'll be flying in no time :clap:
 
I've so far managed to get a tentative grasp of the exposure triangle, and how you can manipulate one 'side' of the triangle to get what you want from the others.

I'm also trying to look at what I'm photographing from an aesthetic point of view rather than concentrating on the technical settings with no thought to whether the picture 'works' so to speak. I do think this will be my weak point though as sadly, I don't seem to have an artistic bone in my body.

Previously I've just been going 'hey, there's some hills and some trees, that must be a good picture', then pay little attention to the composition in favour of trying to get the camera settings right. Now I'm starting to take pictures of what I want to, rather than what I think I should be taking pictures of, and trying to think of what the end result will look like.

One of the things baffling me is when taking landscapes, is how to work out the optimum aperture i.e how can you tell what aperture you'll need to get it all in focus? I've seen people on here say something like "at F8 it'll be in focus from X feet onwards, but no idea how they know that.
 
alltaken said:
I've so far managed to get a tentative grasp of the exposure triangle, and how you can manipulate one 'side' of the triangle to get what you want from the others.

One of the things baffling me is when taking landscapes, is how to work out the optimum aperture i.e how can you tell what aperture you'll need to get it all in focus? I've seen people on here say something like "at F8 it'll be in focus from X feet onwards, but no idea how they know that.
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One of the great things with digital is that you can shoot a load of images at different settings and view them on your pc within minutes... for free! Well, almost for free. You can then see what effect changing the settings has had :D

Getting it all in focus is really a bit of a fudge, it isn't all in focus it's just in acceptable focus at the size you're viewing it :D

Take a look at some Depth of Field tables and they will give you a clue....

http://www.dofmaster.com/doftable.html

Note that these tables only really work for images of a specific size and when viewed at a specific distance, it's all in the small print...

It may also help to Google "Hyperfocal technique" and you could read the following which includes an explanation of what it is...

http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/article_pages/hyperfocal_distance.html

Happy reading and good luck.
 
I learned the basics when I accidentally went on a course at work and the teacher was excellent. I then happened to be working closely with someone who has a sideline in event/nature photography and is extremely knowledgeable. I'm pretty confident at working out what I've done wrong technically now, and am working on my 'artistic leanings':thinking:

But by far the best way to learn is to take photos!:thumbs:
 
CC92713 said:
so I am at the point where i have learned just enough about photography to really confuse myself:lol: I am more into the artistic side of photographing but I realize how important the thecnical side is too. To those who are pros do you just have all of the settings for lighting and all of the other factors memorized or do you have to try a few different things to really get the pictures you want.... like i know the lower your appeture number(which really means bigger opening, right?) gives you a shallow dof how do you know how low to go for each Photo??? do you ever see what the cameras auto setting suggest and go from ther? sorry this is a very loaded question i just am a little overwhelmed... I just see so many things that i want to capture in photos I just cant always make it happen...yet;)
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Hello I am a beginner as well and I thought I might pass on some advice that helped me get over the overwhelming part of setting up your shoot. I had posted the question "where do I start" as far as setting.

The advise was to find what the priority of the shots is. For instance if you are taking a head shot and want to blur the background then the priority would be dof so make that setting first and adjust your exposure around that setting. Same with shutter priority and so on. This method helped me simplify the setup and eased that overwhelming feeling of not wanting to forget anything and not knowing where to start.

This may seem trivial for the experienced but for us beginners its useful.

I hope it helps you.
 
Thanks everyone! I really appreciate it, i will definately keep practicing as much as possible! you are all really helpful
 
woof woof said:
Take a look at some Depth of Field tables and they will give you a clue....

http://www.dofmaster.com/doftable.html

Note that these tables only really work for images of a specific size and when viewed at a specific distance, it's all in the small print...

It may also help to Google "Hyperfocal technique" and you could read the following which includes an explanation of what it is...

http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/article_pages/hyperfocal_distance.html
Click to expand...

Thanks Alan, I will have a read. :)
 
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