Using Camera's Manual Mode
- Admin
- May 11, 2018
- 6 min read
Hello there, welcome back to my yet another blog post! This post will tell you all about using manual mode of your camera. I have seen many people using DSLR but having zero knowledge about how to use it and then people end up using auto mode of their camera. I have seen that people are usually afraid of using the manual mode, as they think that it has lots of settings to adjust and very confusing.Also people complain that they don't get the desired shot when they use manual mode of their camera. Actually manual mode is not that difficult if understood neatly. Manual mode gives you all those shots that you had dreamed of. It gives you freedom to set exposure as you want,as per your need, you have freedom to play with all the settings.
For those who don't know there camera well, Manual mode in your camera is the shown by the symbol 'M' on the dial situated on the top. Setting your camera on manual mode means that your camera will stop setting or adjusting exposure. You have to set it all manually.
now talking about the manual mode, it consists of some different elements that you need to adjust/set to get your desired shot. They are
- Shutter speed
- Apperture
- ISO
- Metering
So lets see these elements in brief and how do they are important in your photos.
1) Shutter Speed :-
Explaining Shutter speed in simple terms, ' Shutter Speed is the speed at which your camera captures the image'. Shutter speed plays an important role in capturing your image. Many people want to capture an image of bird in flight, but end up getting a blurred and a bad picture. Some times you want to show a object in motion but don't know to show that in your picture. Shutter speed does it all.
When you keep your camera in Manual mode, the smaller dial on your camera is used to change the shutter speed ( for some cameras it is on the top, for some cameras it is in the front near your shutter release button and for some cameras it is in the back ,near your thump). Shutter speed is shown in the form of numbers. For example - 1/1000 or 1/200 or 1/50 or 1" or 10". These numbers denote the time or the speed at which the camera will capture the image. Lets say shutter speed is 1/1000 means 1/1000th of a second , shutter speed 1/50 means 1/50th of a second, shutter speed of 1" means 1 second and shutter speed 10" means 10 seconds. If you set the shutter speed higher , lets say 1/2000 then you will be able to freeze a particular moment like some birds in flight or people playing any sport etc. The below image shows a picture taken at a higher shutter speed. The Image was taken during a birding tour where I freezed the flock of birds in flight using a higher Shutter Speed.
For this photo I have used a shutter speed of 1/500.
Another thing about shutter speed is that when you have a higher shutter speed, there would be less time for light to enter in the camera and result would be a darker photo. In that case you will have to adjust the exposure by changing aperture or ISO. And slower the shutter speed more light will enter the camera sensor. When you keep shutter speed slower. lets say 10" then after you click the shutter release button the camera captures everything that comes in the frame within those 10 seconds, resulting in more light to enter the camera sensor and creating an overexposed image.
See the image below which shows a image taken with slower shutter speed.
When shooting with slower shutter speed, using tripod is recommended because a small shake during a slower shutter speed can cause blur images.
Sometimes medium shutter speed can help you in getting images of objects in motion, that is keeping subject in focus and background in motion. See the image below for reference
For getting such results keep your shutter speed at around 1/20 or 1/30 and when the subject enters the frame slowly move your camera with the subject.
Simplifying the above theory, faster the shutter speed lesser the light enters the camera and objects freezes and slower the shutter speed more the light enters the camera and objects seems in motion.
2) Apperture -
Aperture plays an important role in photographing things. Aperture is basically the opening gap between the blades in the lens. There are aperture blades in the camera lens. The blades are placed in such a way to form a shape of hexagon/octagon based on how many aperture blades the lens has. The size of the gap between the blades which forms the hexagonal shape, can be adjusted. Aperture is denoted by f number and varies between different lenses. Larger the aperture, smaller is the f number and smaller the aperture, larger is the f number. Now comes the question that why is the aperture used and what is effect on image while we change the aperture. Now aperture is basically used to make bokeh effects while taking portraits, or to focus whole frame while clicking sceneries , or want to reduce light in the image to reduce or increase the exposure. When we keep the aperture wide open i.e. lower f number ,for example - f/1.8 will give you bokeh effect in the background. Lower aperture number will help you make the background blur,or create bokeh effect and make your subject stand out from the background. But at the same time, as the blades are wide open there will be more light entering the frame, thus you will have to adjust the exposure by increasing the shutter speed or by decreasing the ISO. Also the smallest f number will result in smaller focusing area i.e. the camera will focus maximum on the spot where you set the focus point. Now when we keep the f number smaller i.e. aperture smaller the camera, for example - f/22. Then the camera will focus on the whole frame and won't make the background blur.It will take the whole frame in focus. This is genrally used to click scenery or capture milkyway etc. larger f number means smaller aperture which will result in less amount of light entering the camera, thus you will have to adjust the exposure by either decreasing the shutter speed or increasing the ISO. Following illustration below will help you understand Aperture easily.
3) ISO -
ISO means the light sensitivity of the camera sensor. ISO can be used to increase or decrease the light sensitivity and thus increasing the exposure in the image. Higher the ISO creates more noise in the image. Noise can be described as the pixels that are visible in the image. If you increase the ISO you will see dot/grains/pixels in the image. Lower ISO won't only create less noise but also will enhance the colour and dynamic range, which is the ability of the camera to show details of things in shadow as well as direct sunlight. But sometimes increasing ISO is required in situations where there is less light and you also need to use faster shutter speed. In such cases you need to increase the ISO. Bigger the camera sensor, lower will be the impact of increased ISO on you image. For example - If you have a crop senor camera and if setting the ISO at 1600 creates noise in the image, then while using a full frame camera noise will be seen in the image higher than 1600, i.e. at 1600 you will get a clear image than a crop sensor.
If a subject is moving in speed and you want to freeze the subjevt in the motion in that case you have to increase the ISO. Sometimes you are shooting a subject, and have a tripod , in that case you can mount the camera on the tripod, decrease the shutter speed, and lower the ISO. Thus ISO is one of the most important factor in photography.
These are the three main components of using a manual mode in your camera. There are more components which I will discussing about in the upcoming blogs. But for now understand these three components learn how to use them, try yourselves, practice more by playing with these three components and making the exposure perfect. Whenever you have free time, take your camera in your hand and try clicking objects with different manual settings.
If you have any doubts or questions about this blog and manual settings then do let me know. I will surely answer your questions and doubts about the same. Next blog would about other components of manual mode . Till then stay tuned to my facebook page for updates and keep clicking!
- Ronak Barhanpukar
(RBPhotography)
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