Week 1 Homework Assignment

On Wednesday I started my first photography class. I signed up for a four week Intro class at a studio located in Manchester. I really enjoyed it and I am very glad that I signed up. The class is a lot of fun, very laid back. I am already excited for next weeks class, though I am most looking forward to week 3 when we get to try out all kinds of amazing expensive lenses! Just in time to start my wish list to Santa!

In the first class we discussed the 4 basic exposure modes and what makes up an exposure. A lot of this I had already read about online and in books so I did have a basic understanding of the concepts but it was still nice to have an actual person explain it face to face. His analogies helped me grasp the concepts better too! We were given a homework assignment but we don't have to turn anything in, so I though I would use my blog to post my assignments and keep me accountable!

The first assignment was to practice using the exposure modes on the camera. Part 1 was to capture motion using the Shutter Priority feature (TV on Canon or S on Nikon). To capture motion you are looking for a slow shutter speed like 1/15.

I took a bunch of pictures of moving things like David riding his bike down the driveway. This one of the pinwheel is my favorite. You can see that the spinning motion of the pinwheel is blurry but the background is relatively sharp.

Shutter: 1/15
Aperture: f/20
Focal Length: 50 mm
ISO: 200

Part 2 of the assignment was to stop motion. Ever wonder how you could get that perfect picture of your kids jumping up in the air and have it all be in focus? Well this is how! To stop motion you want a fast shutter speed. So if you are using 1/15 for capturing motion you would want something much, much faster to stop it. For this assignment I used the recommended 1/1000 and spinning the same pinwheel you can see that it looks like it's perfectly still.

Shutter: 1/1000
Aperture: f/4.5
Focal length: 50mm
ISO: 200

Part 3 & 4 of the assignment related to Depth of Field. A deep depth of field, will have foregrounds and backgrounds in focus whereas a shallow depth of field will have a sharp focus on the foreground and a blurry background. To create a deep depth of field you want a small aperture like f/22 and for a shallow depth of field you would want a large aperture like f/4 (and yes that is correct, aperture is backwards the small number = large aperture).

Shutter: 1/60

Aperture: f/22

Focal length: 90mm

ISO: 200

Shutter: 1/1250

Aperture: f/5.6

Focal length: 90mm

ISO: 200

My lens is very limiting. Some of the nicer (more expensive) lenses will have apertures that are as low as f/1.4. But you can still see a difference in the background in the two pictures.

There is one more part of the assignment that I haven't worked on yet but I will this week. It is using the exposure compensation feature on the camera. I am looking forward to seeing how these ones turn out. It will be a good intro into really learning how to read the cameras histogram.