3 Easy Steps to Photography Mastery

3 – Become at 1 with your camera

Imagine seeing a scene and knowing instinctively which lens, F-Stop, ISO and shutter speed to use.

Well many people have that instinct – and they get it from learning the techy side of things. This is the world of :-

• f-stops
• ISO
• white balance
• focal length
• shutter speed
• metering
• histograms
• manual exposure
• stops

I’ve put this AFTER composition as I truly believe that people can get bogged down getting technical, end up creating truly tedious photos (because they don’t know how to compose an interesting shot) and lose heart. So get your head around composition first, then get nerdy.

There are many techy tricks you learn to partner composition:-

• busy backgrounds can destroy your composition, but using a long lens and wide aperture “blurs” the background, rescuing the shot…
• if you use a 200mm lens and a shutter speed of 1/2 second, you will get a blurry photo unless you use a tripod.
• if your shutter speed is too slow, just increase the ISO and you’ll get a faster exposure.

The best way to learn is by experimenting – work through all the F-Stops and see what happens to your depth of field, and shutter speed. Once you see for yourself, it beds into your memory and becomes second nature.

The most important things are:-

• Shutter speed – freezing or blurring things
• F-Stops – blurry backgrounds or everything sharp – and everything in between!
• ISO – making shutter speeds longer or shorter, depending on what you want to achieve
• Manual Exposure – the only way to truly learn how the above 3 work together, it’s a “triangular” relationship.