Camera Basics

A Brief Introduction to Shutter, Aperture, and ISO

         What is shutter?

         Your camera collects and monitors light using three things: shutter, aperture, and ISO. These three light gathering functions work together to balance light in order to properly expose a photograph. Shutter is the amount of time that a photo is being taken. The shutter is represented as a fraction such as 1/200. That means that the shutter will be open for one two-hundredths of a second.

         When thinking about shutter, you must also keep in mind the amount of motion that will show up in your photographs. For faster movement, you will want to use a faster shutter speed to capture the subject without blurring.

         For slower motion or no motion at all, you can set the shutter speed as long as you can without your own arm movement affecting the photograph. If you have a tripod, go crazy and set the shutter speed as low as you want! Just remember, don’t let the tripod or camera move or else your photograph will be blurry.

         What is the aperture?

         When using the aperture, you must determine how much depth of field (out of focus background) you want in your photograph as well as balance the amount of light entering your camera’s sensor.

         The aperture can be confusing. A lower aperture numerical such as f/1.4 lets in a lot of light and has the most depth of field.

         A higher aperture numerical such as f/20 lets in a very limited amount of light and has the least depth of field.

         So, as the aperture numbers get smaller, the more light and more depth of field you will produce. The opposite is true for the higher numbers. As the aperture numbers get larger, the less light and less depth of field you will produce.

         Learning to balance the light and depth of field you desire for your photograph takes a lot of practice. Understanding the concept of aperture is the first step!

         What is ISO?

         To me, ISO is the person in a family who moderates and makes peace with every situation. If you are struggling to get the light just right with shutter and aperture, ISO comes along and resolves the issue… then shutter and aperture hug and make up. It’s a beautiful thing.

         If the photograph is still too bright or dark, use the ISO to fix it. Low ISO numbers such as ISO 100 make the camera sensor less sensitive to light. Higher ISO numbers such as ISO 3200 make the camera sensor more sensitive to light. A darker situation calls for a higher ISO number. A lighter situation calls for a lower ISO number.

         The only thing you need to be careful about with the ISO is if you get your ISO too high, you will start to see noise in your photograph. Now, when I refer to noise, I’m talking about the grainy texture that will show up in the photograph. Noise can be fixed in Lightroom or Photoshop, however the photo will look a lot better if you can eliminate the noise while you’re shooting.

         I know that was a quick overview of shutter, aperture, and ISO. Have no fear! I’m going to touch on all three more in depth in just a little while!