I speak to a number of people who are new to photography and feel overwhelmed by all of the terminology and settings and all of the wonderful things that cameras can do.
And there is tons of advice available on the internet. However there are some pieces of advice that I give where I can see that little light go off over people’s head, where they, perhaps for the first time, understand one more little detail that will help them on their path of learning.
For people who are intimidated by the concept of shutter speed and aperture I suggest the following:
1. Find a room with no one else in it.
2. Find your favourite teddy bear (bunnies, frogs, and stuffed elephants are also good helpers).
3. Explain to your teddy bear that his job is to sit there on the chair/table/bed and pose for you.
4. Now you as the photographer are going to take a series of photos of Mr. Teddy. First, set your camera to shutter priority. Don’t worry about aperture. Set your ISO to the lowest number (probably 100 or 200). Set your shutter speed to 1/8000 (or whatever the fastest speed/highest bottom number is).
5. Take a picture of Mr. Teddy.
6. Change the shutter speed by one “click” – perhaps from 1/8000 to 1/4000.
7. Take a picture of Mr. Teddy – the exact same photo you took in step 5 – same location, same focus, etc….
8. Continue the previous steps, changing ONLY the shutter speed by one “click” or one step at a time until you are in to the full seconds of shutter speed.
9. Thank your teddy bear for posing for you.
10. Look at the photos you just took on the computer. With a notebook at your side, look at each photo, jot down the setting for each photo and write down what you notice about the pictures. (Hint: as the shutter stays open longer, pay attention to any motion you notice, how much light there is in the photo, and then how many other things in the frame are in focus.)
When you have done your homework, you should have a bit more understanding of the effect of the shutter speed on a still object.
Now what happens if you do the same experiment, except this time stand outside and photograph cars as they go by on the street. Start with a fact shutter speed, change it one step at a time, etc…
When was the action frozen? When was it hard to keep the car in focus? When did you end up with a blurry car but the trees in your neighbor’s yard in focus?
You can do the exact same experiments with aperture and ISO. Change ONLY the one setting, only one step at a time. Look at the photos on the computer and jot down the settings for each picture.
And now you are one step closer to being able to tell the camera to do what you want it to do.
