Aperture and Shutter Speed Explanation and Practical Task

What are they?:

Aperture: In a camera, when a picture is taken, the ‘shutter’ is opened up then closed to gather light for the photo, aperture is simply how large the shutter opens up by, aperture is usually measured in f-stops. 

Manipulating these ‘f-stops’ gets you different results, in short, the larger measure of f-stop you use, the more of the photograph taken will be in focus and vice versa, this is what is known as ‘Depth of field’ simply put, how far in the photo’s background is in focus. say if you wanted a picture of an object and you wanted to draw attention to said object, you’d use a smaller F-stop to make sure it’s in focus and if you wanted a whole background in focus you’d have a larger F-stop. Example: F/22 (left) and F/2.8 (right).

Shutter Speed: You know how I said earlier that the camera’s shutter opens up to let in light?, well shutter speed is how long the shutter opens for, meaning more or less light is gathered, it is measured in seconds. the longer the shutter is open the more light the camera will gain, but that also means more movement will be captured in the form of a blur, so if you were to be using a longer shutter speed at night to gain more light, you  would need a tripod as apposed to handheld as there is less chance of the camera moving while the photo is being taken.

Shutter Speed, like Aperture, can be manipulated for different effects, say if you wanted a freeze frame of a fast paced sport, you would have a shorter shutter speed, so the shutter shuts right in the moment, catching the exact point, like what is seen in this photo.

The opposite can be said if you wanted to get a trail, or a blur, say if you wanted a waterfall to have an otherworldly feel, you’d have a longer shutter speed so that the camera gets more data and blur before it processes the image as seen in this photo.

References: D.Rowse. 2015.Introduction to Aperture in digital photography. Digital Photography School. Available at: http://digital-photography-school.com/aperture/     [accessed 31/10/16]

D.Rowse. 2015.Introduction to Shutter Speed in digital photography. Digital Photography School. Available at: http://digital-photography-school.com/shutter-speed/ [accessed 31/10/16]

2016.Pinterest [accessed 31/10/16]

Practical task:

we were also asked to take different photos, experimenting with different shutter speeds and f-stops, here is my power point showcasing them.experimenting-with-different-f-stops-and-shutter-speeds2