Photography 101Basics of hardware

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWxo6Dl3E14

Types of digital cameras

• Webcams/phone cams• Point and shoot• Intermediate• Advanced Consumer• Prosumer dSLR• Professional dSLR

Camera lenses

• Wideangle zoom

• Standard• Superzoom• Telephoto

zoom• Macro• Fisheye

Wideangle zoom lensA wideangle digital camera lens typically covers a focal range from around 12-24mm or 16-35mm, and allows you to fit landscape scenes, architecture or anything else where you need a wide angle of view.

Standard lensThe standard digital camera lens offers a focal length of around 50mm, which translates to around 75mm on many DSLRs. As such, a 50mm camera lens lends itself perfectly to portraiture, particularly as such lenses often offer wide maximum apertures to create shallow depth of field.

Superzoom lensSuperzoom digital camera lenses are a popular choice for keeping on your camera, as they span a wide focal range, from wideangle right through to telephoto. Typically this will begin at around 28mm and culminate at close to 270 or 300mm.

Telephoto zoom lensA telephoto digital camera lens gets you closer to the action, and so is ideal for sports and wildlife where you may need to keep your distance. These can either been prime or zoom lenses, and usually cover a focal range of between 100mm to 400mm.

Macro lensMacro lenses can focus closer to your subject than a conventional lens allows, which allow you to capture plenty of intricate details.

Fisheye lensesFisheye lenses offer an exceptionally wide angle of view but are purposefully distorted to create the ‘fisheye’ effect. They come in two different varieties: full-frame and circular, which respectively capture an image to fill the whole frame and a circular image contained within the frame.

Pixels

• What are pixels? The word "pixel" means a picture element. Every photograph, in digital form, is made up of pixels. They are the smallest unit of information that makes up a picture. Usually round or square, they are typically arranged in a 2-dimensional grid.

• In the next image, one portion has been magnified many times over so that you can see its individual composition in pixels. As you can see, the pixels approximate the actual image. The more pixels you have, the more closely the image resembles the original.

For more information, visit http://www.ultimate-photo-tips.com/what-is-a-pixel.html

Terminology

• F-NUMBERS: A series of numbers designating the apertures, or openings at which a lens is set. The higher the number, the narrower the aperture. For example, f/16 is narrower (by one stop) than f/11--it lets in half as much light. An f-number range might be f/2.8, f/4, f/5.6, f/8, f/11...To find the next aperture in a narrowing series, multiply by 1.4. F-numbers are arrived at by dividing the diameter of the opening into the focal length of the lens, thus a 10mm diameter opening on a 110mm lens is f/11. Alternately used with f-stops.

Setting the Right F-Stop for Your Digital Photo

• Use an almost-wide-open f-stop to boost sharpness.

• Adjust your depth of field by moving f-stops.• Avoid too-small f-stops.

• A prefix on film speed ratings that stands for International Standards Organization, the group that standardizes, among other things, the figures that define the relative speed of films.

DSLR Basicshttp://www.digitalslrphoto.com/dslrbasics/

What makes a good photograph?

Composition

• Rule of Thirds– The rule of thirds is the simplest rule of

composition. All you do is take your frame and overlay a grid of nine equal sections. This means you split the vertical space into three parts and the horizontal space into three parts.

Perspective

• Photographing your subject straight-on is sometimes the right choice, but you can create visual impact by moving the camera left, right, above, and below.

Light• Manual settings• Natural light• Indoor lighting• Consider all options!

FOCUS

• Auto focus• Focus Points

http://photographylife.com/dslr-autofocus-modes-explained

Location

• Indoor• Outdoor• Landscape mode?• Portrait mode?• “Frame” the image

Size of subjects

• Consider settings• Lens type• Tiny?• Giant?

Considerations • Skin tones• Hair and makeup• Eyeglasses/sunglasses• Other details?

Uploading and Emailing Images

Tagging and Descriptions

• Tags are “Subject headings” (flickr)• Tagging someone (Facebook) - considerations• Image descriptions, titles, etc.

Emailing images

• Consider image size• Make a call to confirm• Only send 2-3 images per

email • Best option: upload to site

and share URL via email• NOTE: you can share photo

albums from Facebook to those not on Facebook!

Thank you!• Dr. Curtis R. Rogers• Communications

Director• 803-734-8928• crogers@statelibrary.sc.gov

• Pamela Hoppock• Library Development

Consultant• 803-734-8646• phoppock@statelibrary.sc.gov