What to learn first in Photography?

briamagee

briamagee

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Briana
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Hi!

I'm a newbie in photography. I wanted to start from the basics of photography. Can anyone share thoughts on what are the basic things to learn first?

Thanks!
 
The Exposure Triangle - ISO, Shutter Speed, Aperture. Sometimes you need to control the aperture to get the Depth of Field you want, and sometimes you need to control the shutter speed.
 
redddraggon said:
The Exposure Triangle - ISO, Shutter Speed, Aperture. Sometimes you need to control the aperture to get the Depth of Field you want, and sometimes you need to control the shutter speed.
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Where can I learn more about that? Newbie too here.
 
If you're more of a book person, I found Understanding Exposure by Bryan Peterson a very good read.
 
Thanks, I got the book but I'm more the "see, do it" type so I'll probably rely on the videos.
 
markyp23 said:
The most important thing is composure.
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Composition isn't something you can learn easily, it's acquired from years of shooting, you can learn the "rules" but that won't give you the eye for an awesome shot.

Now exposure is something you can easily learn because it's pretty much physics and the rules are pretty much unbreakable - you have only a small latitude in the correct exposure.
 
Pity I did not see this earlier, but Creative Live are running a course at the moment on Camera Basics you can catch this each day this week (reruns of the previous lessons are done between each new days lessons) catch them on www.creativelive.com/live they are free to watch.
 
While I agree that both exposure and composition are very important, IMO composition will be most important as the exposure can be handled by the camera. Maybe it wouldn't be exactly how you wanted it, but it'd have a good attempt. Anyway, IMO if you're just starting out then reading the manual would be the most important thing.
 
New to the forum, not sure if allowed to post links so if not please delete this.
But I found this website quite helpful.. http://www.geofflawrence.com/index.html Only real basic stuff mind.

Hope all goes well.
 
As aforementioned, the relationship between ISO, Shutter Speed & Aperture. Once you've grasped a bit of the theory you can take your camera out & get a real feel for it.

Composition, Vision, Experiments & Inspiration can all come afterwards. Best wishes.
 
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Cameras can sort out the exposure for you but they don't have a clue about composition!
Good book for composition is "The Photographers Eye". Covers all the aspects that make a well composed photo and worth reading a few times for it to become second nature.

The exposure triangle is in fact simple if explained well and the best way may be to talk face to face to someone who understands it well so they can clear up/reword any parts you don't understand. 10 minute conversation.
 
redddraggon said:
The Exposure Triangle - ISO, Shutter Speed, Aperture. Sometimes you need to control the aperture to get the Depth of Field you want, and sometimes you need to control the shutter speed.
Click to expand...

its hard to do all this but i guess it takes time
 
CrazyWilde said:
its hard to do all this but i guess it takes time
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If it wasn't worth spending the time to learn it, no one'd have suggested it. It can be hard but once you've grasped the theory of it it's just shooting like it :} it's honestly not too bad & everyone on here {usually} is pleased to help & answer any questions you might have. Best wishes!
 
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IamAshlyRose said:
If it wasn't worth spending the time to learn it, no one'd have suggested it. It can be hard but once you've grasped the theory of it it's just shooting like it :} it's honestly not too bad & everyone on here {usually} is pleased to help & answer any questions you might have. Best wishes!
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thanks ashly im so new to photography i dont know where to start so ill be hounding u all for advice :)(y)
 
Unless you're talking about straight news/documentary photography I think photography is a fusion of creativity and vision with technical competence.

Technical competence may deliver sharp and well exposed images, but that does not necessarily make them interesting to look at or especially rewarding. Creativity and vision is, IMHO, far more important in producing pictures which you and others will enjoy. Better an interesting image with slight technical flaws than a sharp, shiny and desperately boring shot.

If the best compliment that someone pays to your photographs is to call them sharp and well exposed then by all means take the compliment, but realise that your picture may not have stirred their soul. Is sharp and well exposed enough to make it worthy of a place on your wall?

To a degree modern cameras can take care of the technical side of things for you if you leave them on auto, but they can never pick the subject, the scene, the pose, the lighting, the timing, the perspective, the composition of your shot. They don't create the story line or attempt to convey a sentiment or mood. There is so much about photography that is related to the eye and the heart. Arguably, mastering the technical elements are relatively trivial by comparison.

So what is most important to you - interesting photographs or technically perfect ones. Ideally you will produce both, but if you had to pick one aspect to concentrate on as a priority...... what would it be?
 
Totally agree Tim. I understood exposure within minutes as it is not as hard as perceived (or wasn't to me) but getting good composition and interesting shots - well that is something I am still failing at and continually working on.

Of 100 shots taken, 98 will be decently exposed but 2 will be shots I want to keep due to having something good about them.
 
I'd say Focusing would be the first thing to learn, followed by Exposure. You can have a perfectly exposed image, but if it is out of focus, or not focused on the thing you wanted, then you probably won't be happy with the image. :shrug:

Bad Exposure can (most of the time) be compensated for when editing, but once something is not sharp... :shrug: :bang: You should always try to get the perfectly exposed image of course. :)

Bryan Peterson has some good vids on Youtube about the Creatively correct Exposure.

Creative Shutter Speeds

Changing Apertures


He has quite a few videos to have a look at. You can only learn stuff. ;)


As a side note, I did not expect him to look like that. :eek: :LOL:
 
Absolutely ISO Aperture and shutter speed along with focusing. Personally I wouldn't bother with understanding exposure, I would look at basic photography by Michael langham (that's his name iirc) a far better book imho.
 
EdBray said:
Pity I did not see this earlier, but Creative Live are running a course at the moment on Camera Basics you can catch this each day this week (reruns of the previous lessons are done between each new days lessons) catch them on www.creativelive.com/live they are free to watch.
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As mentioned by EdBray, the Creativelive course 'Fundamentals of Digital Photography 2012 with John Greengo' that was transmitted last week was excellent. It was so good that I bought it as my first Creativelive course download. :) It will help me a lot work as well with my general photography.

He was a very visual presenter, and apparently showed about 2000 slides to illustrate what he was talking about. :eek: I've downloaded the first 4 days of videos which worked out at close to 2GB each day. You also get PDFs of a lot of the slides he used. Well worth it imho as a resource you can keep going back to.
 
tdodd said:
Unless you're talking about straight news/documentary photography I think photography is a fusion of creativity and vision with technical competence.

Technical competence may deliver sharp and well exposed images, but that does not necessarily make them interesting to look at or especially rewarding. Creativity and vision is, IMHO, far more important in producing pictures which you and others will enjoy. Better an interesting image with slight technical flaws than a sharp, shiny and desperately boring shot.

If the best compliment that someone pays to your photographs is to call them sharp and well exposed then by all means take the compliment, but realise that your picture may not have stirred their soul. Is sharp and well exposed enough to make it worthy of a place on your wall?

To a degree modern cameras can take care of the technical side of things for you if you leave them on auto, but they can never pick the subject, the scene, the pose, the lighting, the timing, the perspective, the composition of your shot. They don't create the story line or attempt to convey a sentiment or mood. There is so much about photography that is related to the eye and the heart. Arguably, mastering the technical elements are relatively trivial by comparison.

So what is most important to you - interesting photographs or technically perfect ones. Ideally you will produce both, but if you had to pick one aspect to concentrate on as a priority...... what would it be?
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This is exactly the answer I'd have given.^
 
The first thing is to get out and start using your camera. Only by taking shots and making the sort of pictures you want will you start to learn.
If you take one you do like, even if the camera is set to full auto mode, and autofocus, look at the image, decide what you like about it, look at the exposure information, and work out how you might do something different to improve it further.
Most of all, learn to have fun making great photos.
 
gad-westy said:
If you're more of a book person, I found Understanding Exposure by Bryan Peterson a very good read.
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I'm about 100 pages into this book and to be honest I set it down to read another one. Perhaps I have not got to the informative part yet but It's a bit basic so far. I really haven't picked up more than a couple of useful points. Seems a bit of a showcase for his pics, just my opinion so far.
 
I wouldn't bother with a book about exposure. There are three things you can change on your camera to alter exposure. And if you're going to be using your in camera meter most of the time (which I assume is highly likely) then you need to understand the basic principle of how a reflective light meter works.

You can learn that by reading two paragraphs online and then get on with learning how to take interesting photographs. (y)
 
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