Fundamentals Of Photography

  FUNDAMENTALS OF PHOTOGRAPHY ONLINE COURSE   THIS FREE ONLINE COURSE REQUIRES A REGISTERED USER ACCOUNT.   To access the online photography course, please complete our free registration form below. Once submitted, you will receive a verification email and link to the online course. If you do not receive the verification email within 20 minutes, please check your spam or junk folder   If you have previously registered for the course, please log-in with your credentials in the box to …

  ISO, WHITE BALANCE, AND EXIF In the last course, we talked about aperture, shutter speed, and other fundamental camera settings. Now that you have got that foundation under you, this chapter will introduce a couple of slightly more complicated tools. Owner’s Manual Alert! Have your camera’s owner’s manual somewhere you can find it during this chapter. You’re going to need it for your homework. If you threw it away (I won’t judge), you can find it online by Googling …

  CAMERA MODES DEFINED Cameras contain different modes that help us with our exposure and the settings we have been discussing in the past chapters. Everyone asks me, “Wwhat is the best mode to set your camera in?”, and I always answer, “All of them!”. All the modes excel in certain types of photography, and all suffer in others. Learning to use all the modes will help you adapt to different scenes, actions, and subjects with superior results. You will …

  COMPOSITION (PART 1) For the last three chapters, we’ve been covering technical knowledge: the meanings of your camera’s settings and how to get the most out of each one. You can call those first three units “photography as a science.” This chapter is different. Consider these topics “photography as an art.” It’s easy to tell when a photo is overexposed or poorly color-balanced. It’s much harder to get a handle on what makes good composition. However, just because things …

  COMPOSITION (PART 2) Let’s continue our discussion on composition. In the last chapter, we covered the Rule of Thirds, the Rule of Odds, and how to choose a background. The techniques in this chapter will give you even more tools to take well composed photographs.   LESSON 5: INTERNAL FRAMING Framing is another way to draw the viewer’s eye toward certain elements of your photograph. Every photo is automatically framed by the limits of the camera, but by including …

  PERFECT EXPOSURE USING THE HISTOGRAM With the invention of digital cameras came the best tool for achieving perfect exposure in the field: the histogram. The histogram displays the amount of darks, lights, and neutral tones in an image. By reviewing your histogram after each shot, you can gain a better understanding of how your camera processes the scene, which will let you make adjustments to achieve that perfect exposure. Below, you’ll see a picture I took of a lighthouse, …

  PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER AND CHEAT SHEETS We have covered a lot of information in the course, and I wanted to take a little time to put it all together. There’s one fantastic thing about what you’ve learned so far: it’s easy to apply it to any type of photography you’re interested in. Whether you want to photograph the Milky Way at night or a hummingbird in flight, you can find camera settings that fit your needs. In the …

  CONTINUING YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY JOURNEY We’ve arrived at the end of the Fundamentals of Photography course. If you’ve made it this far, congratulations! You know your RAW from your JPEG, your Rule of Odds from your Rule of Thirds, and all the details of how Aperture, Shutter Speed, and ISO work together. You’ve reached the limits of basic photography. Everything you learn beyond this point is specific to styles or subjects — from the angles used by sports photographers to …