As I mentioned in my last Friday Photo post I recently rented a lens from BorrowLenses.com. I could review their service, which was excellent when I had a problem, but I’m going to review the lens I got instead. There is some good and some bad to this story.
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In short, ISO is the sensitivity of the film or digital sensor.
To give you the best example of what changes in ISO does to a photo, I made a chart below. Using a ribbon origami rose that I made, these photos are taken with a Canon 40D, so different cameras will have different results. The large picture at the top is taken at the lowest ISO of 100 to show what the entire picture is. Below that I have images of each ISO setting at 1/3rd increments. These are 100% of the pixel size right out of the camera. For each ISO change I had to also change the shutter speed. The aperture was the same in each at f/5.6.
At the beginning I have the two extremes of the highest and the lowest next to each other to show the dramatic difference. Then at the very bottom that full photo is taken with 1600 ISO. The reason I did this is to show, depending on the use (here being the web), a high ISO will still be a suitable option. At this small size on a website, the noise is barely noticeable. But blow it up to a 16×20 print and the difference between them will be quite intense. I very rarely would use 3200 ISO, and isn’t really native to this camera (thus the H). But it is nice to have available in a pinch.
ISO is a standardization that was Read the rest of this entry »
The shutter is what really makes a camera. In essence a camera is just a box that holds some film or a sensor with a hole in the end that opens and closes to let in light. This is evident from as far back as the camera obscura which helped artists essentially trace a picture of a person to resemble their likeness. Similar to that is the pin-hole camera, where a piece of film or printing paper is placed inside a camera and literally a pin-hole is punched in the other end which can be uncovered to take some surprisingly phenomenal photographs. Only slightly more complex from this is a typical 35mm camera. This can introduce aperture, which is actually dependent on the lens. It also gives the ability to adjust mechanically the time the shutter is open. The size of the opening through the lens dramatically decreases the amount of time that the shutter need be open in comparison to pin-hole cameras. Then with DSLRs (Digital Single Lens Reflex) cameras, the only thing that is really changed is instead of the shutter opening to a silver halide film plane, it opens to a light sensor of some kind. Today the typical is the CMOS sensor, which is beyond the scope of this post to explain.
Shutter speed generally adjusts from 1/8000 of a second to as long as you want it open, Read the rest of this entry »
I recently went to the local county fair where I shot a number of photos of the fireworks display. They had an impressive show and I’d like to share some of it and how to take great fireworks photos yourself. Unfortunately, photos never can really give a real indication of not only the scope, but the feeling of a fireworks display.
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Here is a photo idea I had that didn’t quite pull through. I’d like to know what you, my dear readers, think (add your comments at the bottom). I’ll write my thoughts below.
My original idea was to combine at least two or more of my skills together into one shot, to show a little more of what or who I am. Read the rest of this entry »
