Aperture & Shutter Speed Review
Light Meters Your camera s light meter measures the available light in a scene. It does so by averaging all of the reflected light in the image to find 18% gray. By metering off of your gray card, you can fool your light meter into giving you a more accurate reading. Otherwise, a mostly white scene will be too dark and a dark scene, too light. You can meter off of your palm and increase the exposure by one stop. Light meters vary by camera. Most light meters have a +/- system or a red/green light to let you know when your aperture and shutter settings are correct for the available light.
Exposure Corrections If your image is mostly dark tones, your camera will want to overexpose the image to make it middle gray. You will need to stop down to let in less light to correct the exposure.
Exposure Corrections If your image is mostly light tones, your camera will want to underexpose the image to make it middle gray. You will need to stop up and let in more light to correct the exposure.
Light Meters Metering a subject against a bright background Move in close and fill the frame with your subject and meter. Move back and use the meter settings to expose the photo. Metering a subject against a dark background Again, move in close to meter. Metering a landscape that includes a bright sky Tilt the camera down and remove most of the sky from the scene to meter.
Camera Controls
Mode Dial
Mode Dial Playback Button
Auto/Manual Focus Selector Shutter Button
Canon
Nikon
About your camera suggested settings Exposure mode - use Manual For this class we will be using your camera s manual exposure settings. Set you camera to Manual and find the combination of buttons and dials on your camera that adjust shutter speed and aperture. Minimum Shutter Speed - You ll need to use a tripod to steady your camera for most exposures under 1/60 of a second
About your camera suggested settings Use 100 ISO outdoors on sunny days, 400 on cloudy days. Try to avoid anything higher than 800. The button or menu access to change ISO is usually readily available on your camera. Don t use the auto ISO setting
About your camera suggested settings Metering use overall/evaluative/average/matrix Other modes are: Spot to selectively choose a small sample to meter Partial Metering A larger sample, but not the entire image
About your camera suggested settings Light meter Move the shutter speed and aperture setting and see how your light meter moves. Point your camera at the floor and check the light meter. Then point it up at the lights. What happened?
About your camera suggested settings Multi/High Speed Continuously shoots while the shutter is pressed Timer Delays the shutter for a fixed period of time. This is handy for long exposure images to reduce camera shake Drive Mode Use single for now
About your camera suggested settings Focus - Use auto or manual, but turn on the tulip (close-up/macro) for close ups. Digital Zoom - Off
About your camera suggested settings Color or White balance - Use Auto, unless I tell you not to for a specific assignment You can change the white balance settings depending on the type of lighting condition you are in, such as daylight, tungsten, florescent, cloudy
About your camera suggested settings Resolution - Use maximum for your camera Image Quality
About your camera suggested settings Choose RAW or RAW + L This may be combined with the Image Quality Menu If your camera doesn t have RAW, then choose L Always choose the largest file size for your camera. It s easy to make images smaller but impossible to make them bigger!
About your camera suggested settings Special Effects Off Take your pictures in color not black and white It s better in Photoshop.
About your camera suggested settings Histogram review On A histogram is a visual graph of the various tones, from black to white, in an image. If you camera has a exposure histogram, you can use it to determine of you ve made a good exposure.
About your camera suggested settings Histograms Canon Press the Info button in the Playback mode to cycle through the histogram options Nikon Set in the Playback Menu or try pressing the Up button in Playback Mode
For Monday Set you camera s ISO to 400 Take a minimum of 20 well exposed images for class using the camera settings we ve discussed today. Get the images of your cat, puppy, significant other, Ansel Adams aspirations, etc. out of your system. Bring your camera, card, hard drive and any cables to download images to class.