ISO, shutter speed and aperture are three key settings of camera exposure. The aperture is actually a hole which allows and controls the amount of light to pass through the photography camera sensor. You can adjust the aperture to control the amount of light to be entered to get different effects on the final image. The aperture is also referred to as f/stop. You must know about your camera aperture as it will help you understand what other settings to be used to get the perfect photography and you will know what errors can occur and how these errors can affect your image. You can join photography classes to have an in detail knowledge about key settings but here we have listed some steps to choose the best aperture:
- Familiarize with basic concepts and terms: You should have knowledge about basic terms and concepts to understand photography blogs and become pro in photography.
- Aperture or stop: The aperture is an adjustable hole which controls the light passes through the lens to the digital sensor or film.
- F-stop or simply aperture: This implies the focal length by the size of the aperture ratio.
- Iris Diagram or simply iris: This is a device used in most cameras to form and adjust the camera aperture.
- Stopping down: It means using a small aperture.
- Opening up: it means using a large aperture.
- Wide open: It means using the largest aperture.
- The Depth of field: It is the particular front to the back area.
- Aberrations: These are the imperfections in the ability of the lens to focus light sharply.
- Diffraction: It is the behaviour of the waves which pass through the small openings that limit the sharpness to a maximum of all lenses at small apertures.
- The 3 types of apertures:
- Storytelling: The storytelling aperture is recognized as f/13 and up. The image or the photograph should have sharpness front-to-back. This aperture is mainly used for landscapes where the foreground and background both are in equal focus. The foreground can be a road, a rock etc. But do not use this for faces. As the f-stop is higher, the light will be less. So lower your shutter speed. You can increase the ISO, but this has the effect of increased noise in the image. Use a wide angle lens to fit the whole scenery. You can join some photography courses to know more.
- The sweet spot: Here the range is f/7.1 to f/11. This kind of photographs has optimum sharpness, colour, contrast and a very small amount of distortion of lens or aberration. Street photography is best on these stops. You can check out some photography sites to get an idea of this kind of photographs. Landscapes, street photography, street photography with people in them all come under “sweet spot”. You can also use for sunrises and sunsets. But do not use for portrait or product photography. For street photography, use a semi-zoom lens.
- Isolation: The aperture is under f/5.6. Use low f-stop for wide open aperture and shallow depth of field. The main use is to isolate an object. Like for a person’s face, you can use this wide aperture and the background will be blurred. Portrait pro photographer uses this wide aperture to capture portrait photographs. When a subject is isolated from the background, it becomes easy for the viewer to understand what the subject is. This aperture is an advantage for faces cause of soft focus. But you should remember to focus on eyes. Do not use for landscapes. You can also use for ‘bokeh’ effect in which is points of lights behind the subject forming a pretty oval which is out of focus. The situations which require the fastest shutter speed can be captured in this aperture. For example, macro, wildlife, sports etc can be captured with this aperture setting. Use a fast lens for this kind of photography. Even for wedding photography or newborn photography, you can use this aperture.
- Get out and shoot: Now when you already know the basics, this is the time you go out and practice on your own. Understand your depth of field. For more depth of field use a small aperture and for shallow depth of field use a large aperture. Also, shoot for special effects to learn more. Shoot at night time or shoot bokeh effects. Shoot photographs for optimum image quality. Once you are done with choosing a lens, try to make the most of clicks with aperture priority mode.
