Shutter Speed, Aperture, and ISO explained

Hi, some technical names you need to conquer to become a better photographer are shutter speed, ISO, and aperture. If you are using the manual function, you will need to set your shutter speed. Say you are trying to take photos of a river and would like to slow down the process of moving water, you would reduce the shutter speed or lower it in numbers.

On the other hand, if you would like to freeze water in the air when you are photographing a waterfall, you will need to increase your shutter speed. It will turn out something like this…

 Something else you need to have in mind with shutter speed is that when you increase it, the photo itself becomes darker. Think of the shutter as a door and if you leave it open for longer it allows more light to come in. When you lower the shutter speed, the photo becomes lighter. 

Then you need to bring in ISO! When you increase ISO, the photo itself becomes lighter and when you lower it the picture becomes darker. ISO ranges; if it is a sunny day, you will usually use ISO numbers between 100-400. The ISO numbers required are totally different if it is cloudy, at night, inside, or dusk. In darker conditions, ISO settings may be 1,000 or even higher. 

Please note if you increase the ISO, the picture will become grainier. If you are shooting at night I suggest using flash or a combination of very slow shutter speed and a high ISO setting. With a slow shutter speed, you will need to be careful to keep your camera balanced.

The last factor to consider is the aperture setting. Think of the aperture of a camera as if it is a pupil in your eyeball. The wider it is the more light it lets in. If you have a low aperture, it lets more light into the camera and if you have a higher aperture it lets in less light. As you become more familiar with taking photos using the manual setting of a camera, you will learn to assimilate shutter speeds, aperture, and ISO.  All of these things work together in a triangle!