A Guide for the Future: the Aperture Chart

During the previous lessons, we talked about the concept of exposure. In line with that, last session, we dwelled on aperture and dug deep into its core principles. As mentioned, we have talked about the aperture for quite some time already and our references can go back to the first section of these lessons.

Last time, we completed everything that we needed to cover regarding aperture already from the mathematics behind it to its practical implications. However, I cannot truly stress the importance of aperture and how much it will pop up from time to time along with your career.

With that said, what we will be doing today is to polish on aperture so we can finally let go of the topic as a lesson and proceed to its practical applications. This article will be a synthesis of the topic from the basic concepts we discussed to the more complex ones.

The topic of aperture is something that you will be carrying along as a photographer and it is a necessary skill to build your own style. Furthermore, continuing to learn and practicing your aperture settings should give you a better grasp of the logic behind cameras, more so the lenses.

If you ever need to brush up on your aperture knowledge, let this article be your guide along the way.

Aperture Chart

To help you visualize the concept of aperture more, you may refer to this chart. As you can see, the lens’ iris has the ability to narrow in or widen. As the aperture widens, you are obviously allowing more light to come in and the opposite happens when the aperture closes in.



Previously, we talked about the f-stop and the math behind it. Basically, the f-stop is the unit of measurement for aperture where the f stands for the focal length you are shooting at. As you can see, beside “f/” is a number and that value is what you divide to your focal length. 

The result of the equation (eg. 50mm / 3.2) is the diameter of your aperture. With that said, as your divisor gets bigger, your diameter gets smaller.

Applications

For low-light settings such as night portraits or indoor events, you want your camera to take in as much light as it can and in order to do that you would want your aperture to open wider. 

As you may have learned, if you want to get your aperture to open bigger, your which pertains to decreasing the number in your f-stop. 

On the other hand, for bright scenarios such as outdoor photography at noon or events with very high lighting, you would want to narrow in your aperture. In order to do that you will start “stopping down” which pertains to increasing the value in your f-stop.

Conclusion

So that’s really it for this article since this lesson is just a condensed version of everything we have learned about aperture. 

The aperture is the camera’s iris and it is one of the parts of your camera responsible for regulating the light that is coming in your camera. Learning how to properly master aperture adjustment takes time and practice so be sure to invest your time on this. 

Apart from the aperture, another thing that regulates light flow in your camera is your shutter speed and that’s what we will be tackling for the next lesson. Much like our treatment for discussing aperture, we will also be trying to complete your shutter speed knowledge already. 

Be sure to keep this article easily accessible to you since, I guarantee you, this will not be the last time you will be consulting it. Share it with your peers as well to help them brush up their skills as well.