Learning Photography

You may have taken up photography as a hobby, to capture memories, or as a stepping stone to becoming a professional photographer, but as a novice, it can be overwhelming.

Photography is both a rewarding hobby and a profession for many people. But to be able to use your camera to take better pictures, you'll need to understand the basic camera features before you begin.

Here are a few quick pointers to help you understand the fundamentals of photography and get started.

Lighting

Light has the power to make or break an image. You can use various lighting modifiers such as a softbox or an umbrella. A portable reflector to fill in shadows is also a useful tool if you're working outside, but you'll need an assistant to carry and place it.

Adjusting the size or opening of the aperture controls the amount of light that enters the camera.

Focus

Having a sharp image captured in your camera's sensor is referred to as focusing. You have complete control over where your camera focuses when you set your focus point.

Selective focus can blur the background and foreground of the picture, focusing the viewer's attention on the in-focus aspect.

Composition & Perspective

When photographing portraits, it's common to want the light to be slightly angular rather than top-down. The Rule of Thirds, framing, leading lines, and negative space are just a few composition techniques that can help you create powerful pictures.

Color Temperature

Kelvin (K) is a unit of measurement for color temperature. The higher the number, the whiter or “colder” the light is.

Different light sources have different color temperatures, and if you don't use the right white balance, your picture could be too blue, too orange, or skewed towards green and magenta.

Exposure Triangle

When shooting in manual mode, you'll need to understand how aperture, shutter speed, and ISO interact to achieve proper exposure.

The depth of focus for the picture will be influenced by the aperture. You can freeze motion by changing the shutter speed. And determining how sensitive your camera would be to light is ISO.

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For aspiring professional photographers, understanding how photography works, how it can be done correctly, and how it can elicit a particular visual emotion is crucial.