We're Tony and Chelsea Northrup and today we're learning to use manual mode
on our cameras. Manual mode can seem kind of scary but it's actually a really useful
way to learn your camera. And once you learn how to use it, you'll be using it all
the time to control your camera's shutter speed and aperture.
First, select manual mode. Most cameras just have a dial with a big M on it. Now
that you're in manual mode you can control your shutter speed and aperture
separately. So let's first start with controlling your shutter speed. You're
gonna want to find the dial that controls that, it's usually your main dial. The
longer your shutter speed is, the more light your camera's going to let in.
It's gonna brighten your pictures but it's also going to introduce camera shake and or
motion blur from your subject. The shorter your shutter speed is, the more
you're gonna freeze action.
But it's also going to make your pictures darker. So let's do a little
exercise now so you can practice controlling your shutter speed and see
what it does to your pictures. So for now I'm gonna have you set your aperture to
the lowest number
and set your ISO to auto, just so you can practice your shutter speed.
I'll start at one fifth of a second and Tony, will you nod your head? And we'll see
if I can capture that motion. More! You could hear that it was a little bit slow.
And sure enough the picture is really blurry
So let's move it up to 1/30th of a second and see what that looks like.
Shake that head, Tony! Sounded a bit faster and it looks quite a bit clearer.
But I think it's still just a little bit blurry so let's bump it up to 1/250th
of a second and see how that works for us.
That sounded nice and fast.
And it looks a lot better too. If you don't have a willing model to shake
their head or move for you, you could always turn on a faucet and try to
freeze the motion of the water. Now that you've figured out how to set the
shutter speed, let's set the aperture. First set the shutter speed to 1/60th
of a second kind of a general good all-around shutter speed. And we'll
choose the lowest possible f/stop number. On this particular lens its f/1.8.
Now, the lower the f/stop number the more the background is going to be blurred and
the more light you're going to be letting in. If you choose a higher f/stop number, the
iris of the lens gets smaller and smaller. That gets more of the background
in focus, but because the opening is smaller it's letting less light in.
Usually you want to use the lowest possible f/stop number that gets your entire
subject in focus. So let's try it out now by taking a couple of test shots.
First, with your shutter speed set to 1/60th, your ISO set to auto and your f/stop set to the
lowest possible number, take a picture.
Notice the blur that's in the background your picture may not be as blurred as my
picture,
it kind of depends on the lens that you're using and the lowest possible f/stop number that
that lens supports. Now let's change the aperture to f/8 and take another
picture.
As you can see at f/8, the background is much less blurry. Let's jump up to f/16
and try it again.
At f/16 the background is much sharper, but you might notice another side effect
it also got noisier. That's because the camera had to automatically adjust the
ISO to a faster ISO speed because the camera was letting in less light. And with
less light, the camera does the best it can but ends up becoming noisy. So I'll
pass it back to Chelsea to explain how ISO works. So your ISO is gonna control
how much light it takes to make your picture bright. This concept sounds a
little bit difficult when explained, so you should just experiment yourself and
take their own pictures. But basically, if you have a low ISO you're gonna need
more light to expose your picture properly. If you have a high ISO, you can
properly expose your picture in a darker environment. If you have a low f/stop
number like f/1.8, you can also have a low ISO number like ISO 100. If you have a
really fast shutter speed, like 1/1000 and you're photographing birds, you'll
need a higher ISO number to properly expose your picture. Sounds like a
mouthful, it sounds really complicated but just get your hands on the ISO and
try it yourself and you'll see what I mean. One thing to keep in mind is that
the lower ISOs are gonna make a cleaner image. If you're using a really
high ISO number you're going to introduce a lot of noise into your
pictures. The higher your ISO the more noise. So try to always use the lowest ISO
possible for your environment. So I'm gonna take my camera off of auto ISO,
like we had it on earlier, we're gonna set our shutter speed to 1/60th of a second and
set your aperture to the lowest number that you can. For me that's 1.8. And we're
gonna take some sample pictures at ISO 200, 800, and 3,200.
Now you can look back at your shots with your different ISOs and see how your shots change.
Did the exposure change? Are some better than others? And which one is closest to the
proper exposure for you? Now let's bring it all together,
controlling each of the three different settings. Starting with shutter speed, you'll
always want to use the slowest shutter speed you can to freeze the motion of
your subject and any camera shake.
With the aperture, you want to choose the lowest f/stop number possible
that gives you the depth of field you need. Basically the lowest f/stop number
that has your entire subject in focus. Then you'll vary the ISO up or down to
properly exposure your picture, checking your histogram to make sure that neither the
left side nor the right side is clipped more than absolutely necessary.
Now for practice. So pick your subject and decide which shutter speed you need. If it's
just a still person you can probably get away with about 1/60th of a second.
If the person is moving, probably 1/250th of a second. I'm going to choose
1/60th of a second because Tony is still and he's just standing here.
Next, choose your f/stop number, the lowest one possible. Now,
take a shot. Next, review your shot. If there's camera shake or motion blur, double your shutter speed.
For example, go from 1/60th to 1/125th of a second. If part of your subject is out of
focus, double your f/stop number. For example, go from f/4 to f/8. Once you've made those
adjustments, make sure that you also adjust your ISO so that your picture is
properly exposed. It all sounds complex, but with practice your hands will begin to
understand how it all works and you'll be able to make adjustments quickly. You
also begin to develop a sense for the right shutter speed, f/stop number and ISO
that you need for different environments. So we took a lot of the
mystery out of shooting in manual, it just takes some practice, it's definitely
not as hard as it sounds.
And if you like this video and you felt like we taught you a lot, you should check
out our book, Stunning Digital Photography, especially chapter 4 where we go more in-
depth into these same subjects. Thank you!