Aperture refers to the hole in your lens that allows the light into the camera. The size of the hole affects the amount of light coming in and the depth of field. It’s measurement is called an F Stop. An F Stop is a fractional degree of light so to explain simply, the bigger the opening the smaller the F number and the larger the opening the larger the F number. Aperture works Incrementally so therefore with each step down the aperture blades let in half as much light.

Aperture Scale

From top to bottom I have listed F Stops from large to small. Starting at f/1.4 which is a very large opening of your aperture blades and lets in lets in a lot of light to f/32 which lets in barely any. Each stop let’s in half the amount of light.

• f/1.4
• f/2.0
• f/2.8
• f/4.0
• f/5.6
• f/8.0
• f/11.0
• f/16.0
• f/22.0
• f/32.0

These are the main aperture “stops,” but most cameras and lenses today let you set some values in between, such as f/1.8 or f/3.5. Which I will demonstrate with my camera in exercise 4.1 below.

Activity 4.1: Aperture and depth of field

For this activity you will need to find a long, uninterrupted subject or scene such as a fence, ladder, ruler or path. Using this subject you will shoot a series of images utilising your full available aperture range.

Set your camera’s shooting mode to Aperture priority (A/Av) and begin with the widest aperture available on your lens (e.g. f/1.4, f/3.5). 

Without moving the camera, shoot multiple images throughout the aperture range (i.e. f/4, f/5.6, f/8, f/11, f/16, f/22). 

Compare the final images. How did your aperture settings affect the depth of field in each image? How did each aperture adjustment affect your other exposure settings (i.e. shutter speed, ISO)

The Results

I set my camera to Aperture Priority mode, selected the largest aperture on my f/5.6 18-55 mm kit lens and walked down to the front of our complex where there is a long brick fence so I could demonstrate this exercise. The largest aperture I can set this lens to is F/5.6 so I started with that and cycled through 17 shots to F/36. As you can see with the gallery below the depth of field , sharpness in the foreground and background as well as colour changes slightly with each image. For the metadata on each image if you click on an image in the gallery it will display it with a larger image on a side scrolling gallery with the Focal length and aperture as well as ISO for each shot. All images are unedited and loaded into Lightroom before sending to my Dropbox as jpgs rather than RAW.

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The tasks

Activity 5.3: Long exposure photography

Long exposure photography refers to images captured using a long, or slow, shutter speed—often in the seconds, rather than fractions of seconds.

Ideal subjects for long exposure photography are sunrises, waterfalls, fireworks, night shots and more. A tripod is essential and a shutter release cable, or camera remote, a bonus.

Activity 5.4: Light painting

Light painting is a technique which involves moving a portable or handheld light source, such as a torch, while taking a long exposure.

The light source can be used either to illuminate the subject or to shine directly at the camera.

The Results

Long exposure photography has long been a favourite of mine or as I like to call it Playing with Light. I don’t get out as often as I should to capture beautiful sunrises , waterfalls, fountains or light trails. For my long exposure in this exercise I chose to nip around the corner to Victoria Road and capture some light trails. For the light painting we used sparklers as I couldn’t find the finger lights. The featured image is one I took at Homebush Bay Near Wentworth Point on The Parramatta River, looking across to Rhodes from Homebush Bay /Olympic Park at Sunset, I used a Nikkor 18-55 mm lens Nikon D3200 ISO 100 F/36 1 sec 55mm and also a pink graduated filter to enhance the pinks and purples in the clouds.

This set of exercises was a great deal of fun, and I got to indulge in one of my favourite activities and get my daughter to join in by letting her dance around with sparklers. It took her a few goes to get what I wanted and while I didn’t get the perfect shot I was after it was fun and it’s more for the technique for the excercise in Camera and Capture module 5.

The location for the light trails isn’t the most interesting as I just popped down around the corner to Maccas because know it’s busy and I could focus easier on the signs in the dark.

For all of the light trails and light painting shots, I shot in bulb mode with tripod and camera release remote so I could shoot for longer periods of time without camera shake.

I really wish I’d had a filter on when I was shooting the light trails so the street lights looked better in the photos but that’s about my only gripe and something I’ll remember next time as it was on my 55-200 mm lens and not on the 18-55 lens I was using when I was shooting.

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My favourite shot is the bottom one where you can just see the charter sign on the bus as it takes off.

This task called for us to capture a portrait and a landscape or cityscape using wide normal and telephoto length lenses. It’s been a while between camera and capture posts with internet issues and hospital appointments for my daughters Crohns Disease management and my autistic sons psychology and TAFE days , also with my partner having been away for almost a month I was having issues with my time management and the realisation it’s impossible to be in two places at once. So I will be posting all the exercises this week that I haven’t had a chance to blog about as well as working on my assessments for all four subjects.

Portrait

Activity 2.1

The portrait task was made more interesting by the fact that we had to keep the same framing at the three different focal lengths which meant moving around and using my reference shot changing lenses as well as using my iPhone as well to guide myself with where my camera should be for each shot. My partner kindly obliged to be the subject for this exercise. I personally prefer the telephoto length shot as my partner is 6’2” ft And I’m a lot shorter, I didn’t feel like we were cramped into a small space and it has a slightly softer quality to the image.

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Activity 2.1 composing my portrait shot

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Cityscape

Activity 2.1

I scouted a few locations until i found the one i wanted and decided to shoot at night. I had a few goes until i found a spot on the river i was happy with but here is one of the locations on Marsden Road that i had initially thought of then dismissed and then decided to have a go because the view over Paramatta is amazing but i just couldn’t get the shot I was after, I did get an okay light trail though.

For my cityscape focal length shots I chose a view from Ermington Boat Ramp looking across the Parramatta River to Rhodes and Olympic Park. Essentially the idea was the same as with the Portraits except that this time the camera and tripod stayed in place and the idea was to zoom in from wide to telephoto to see how the composition of the image changed.

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