Aperture for idiots?

Hey all,

I'm learning the ould ins-and-outs of DSLR photography, but at a pretty slow pace, unfortunately.

For some reason, despite being told what aperture does and having it shown to me numerous times, my brain struggles to figure it out.


Does anyone know of any website that explains it in the simplest of simple terms (preferably something with 'example' shots of different aperture settings on different subjects or something) that a moron like myself can understand?

I've figured out the basics of ISO and Shutter Speed (that is to say, I know what they do and have at a time or two altered them to suit my needs, ie; dark or night time shots) but I can't get my head around aperture for some reason.


Anyone able to help out with any advice or information regarding it?



Cheers

swingking

try here

CabanSail

This Tutorial by Peter Cox is very good. I think it explains things quite well.

Read both of them. Certainly makes things clearer theoretically, though I admit to having difficulty trying it in reality.


Ah sure... Practice, practice, practice I suppose.


Cheers lads

mumof2

In photography you'll learn something new all the time!! Good luck with practising.

the_monkey

I had the same confusion .... this book helps a lot ...


http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/book/9780817463007/Understanding-Exposure

the_monkey

the_monkey wrote: »

I had the same confusion .... this book helps a lot ...


http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/book/9780817463007/Understanding-Exposure

Bah! Tried to buy it using the Paypal checkout and after signing into Paypal and all, it tells me at the last second that "Paypal is currently unavailable, please try again using another payment method". Pricks. €12 is a great price, too.


Off to Eason's with me tomorrow I suppose. See if I can get it in there. I've heard a lot about the book, but I never bothered to get it for some reason.

DotOrg

Deleted User wrote: »

For some reason, despite being told what aperture does and having it shown to me numerous times, my brain struggles to figure it out.

it's very simply, the size of the hole in the lens through which the light passes

you can vary the size of this hole, the wider it is, the more light gets in, the narrower it is, the less light gets in

and just like squinting your eyes, the narrower the hole, the sharper the image becomes

in camera terms the size of the hole is signified by what is called the aperture

a lens using an aperture of f2.8 means the hole is big and wide, lots of light is getting in, but lots of the image will be out of focus

a lens using an aperture of f22 means the hole is really small, so not much light is getting in but the image will be really sharp

that help?

pullandbang

Just to make things even more confusing, the lower the number, the bigger the hole! f2.8 is wider than f22. This in turn will affect your depth of field.

Consult the T & E section of your camera's manual.:)

PS- that's short for Trial & Error

ThOnda

Because the aperture is "1 / something" of the full size hole. So if the Aperture is set to 22, you have only 1/22 the amount of the light falling onto the sensor/film and you need to extend the exposure time to achieve the same exposure.

Chorcai

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWRka0S5CrM

notspav

Deleted User wrote: »

For some reason, despite being told what aperture does and having it shown to me numerous times, my brain struggles to figure it out.

It's something I have a mental block over too. I've kind of figured it out with a lot of trial and error, and basically;

Large aperture = small 'f' number (e.g. f4);
This means that one part of your image in focused and the rest is blurred. Like this, which is f5.6.

Small aperture = large 'f' number (e.g. f20);
This means that most or all of your shot in in focus, like this (f18 in this case).

Typically, you'd use a small aperture for landscapes and a large aperture for portraits or macro shots.

Having said all that, things chance one you start playing around with long exposures (this is f4.5, yet all in focus). Haven't quite figured out why

Fenster

I have a useful mental shortcut: Large hole soft, small hole hard.

Even when I internalize I am pithy with words.

notspav

Fenster wrote: »

I have a useful mental shortcut: Large hole soft, small hole hard.

Even when I internalize I am pithy with words.

I see you went to the Finbar Saunders school of photography

DaireQuinlan

ThOnda wrote: »

Because the aperture is "1 / something" of the full size hole. So if the Aperture is set to 22, you have only 1/22 the amount of the light falling onto the sensor/film and you need to extend the exposure time to achieve the same exposure.

The f-number is actually (focal length) / (effective aperture diameter). However the light is proportional to the AREA of the aperture. So if you take as a base f/1 (which would be an effective aperture the same size as the lens' focal length), then f/22 wouldn't be 1/22 the amount of light, but actually 9 full stops less bright, or 2^9, or 1/512 the amount of light. Each full stop reduces the light by half.

On a related note then, the notion that big f-stop numbers actually correspond to smaller and smaller aperture openings is actually incorrect. Expressed correctly as a ratio (ie f/1.4, f/22 etc etc), the bigger numbers correspond correctly to the bigger aperture openings.