David Hood Photography

It’s the time of year that leaf peeping photographers search for that perfect landscape photo with colorful foliage from the foreground to the background. Once that perfect location is found, the challenge is dialing in the proper exposure and focus settings to capture a photo with a pleasing composition, proper white balance, balanced exposure (minimal loss of detail in shadows or highlights), and acceptably sharp from foreground to background. When tutoring DSLR/Mirrorless clients https://www.davidhoodphotography.com/phototut/, I talk about this phase of the process as the vision phase. It’s important that the photographer have a firm vision of the desired outcome in order to determine the best exposure and focus settings for the the next phase of the process – the capture phase. The purpose of this post is to provide some landscape photography tips. 

This post will concentrate on the capture phase. Composition is a subject unto itself, and is an essential element of the photographer’s “vision” of the capture. Yes, there are “rules” for composition (rule of thirds, leading lines, etc.). Lighting conditions, practice and experience will soon give you  an “eye for photography”, and you’ll know a good composition when you see it. For the photo below https://www.cabq.gov/parksandrecreation/open-space/lands/elena-gallegos-open-space my vision was for the leading lines of the pathway with colorful flowers on either side to draw the viewers eyes toward the Sandia Mountains in the background. I was using my Nikon Z50 with the 16-50mm kit lens.

So let’s get to it and review the thought process behind determining the camera settings for the capture phase. First, I teach my students owning a modern DSLR to shoot in raw mode (as opposed to jpeg mode) because raw mode provides much more latitude than jpeg in editing a photo to maximize the details often lost in shadows and highlights. 

Now the thinking behind the exposure settings for this landscape photo.  Of the 3 elements of the exposure triangle, shutter speed is the least critical. Since I was shooting hand held, I wanted to be at 1/60th second or greater in order to minimize the effects of camera shake.   In this daylight setting with plenty of ambient light, I wanted the second element of the exposure triangle, the ISO setting (the sensor’s sensitivity to light), to be as low as possible in order to minimize “noise” in the photo (artifacts or specs in the image caused by high ISO settings).  The third element of the exposure triangle, the aperture or f/stop, is the most critical setting of any landscape photo because it (as well as the distance from the closest item of interest in the foreground) establishes the depth of field. The smaller the aperture setting, the greater the depth of field (distance between the nearest and furthest elements in a scene that appear to be “acceptably sharp” in an image). I wanted an image that was acceptably sharp from front to back, and at the same time wanted an aperture at which my 16-50mm kit lens was sharpest. For most lenses, this “sweet spot” is at apertures f/8 to f/11 so I chose f/10 for my aperture. Using the f/10 aperture and ISO 100, the resultant shutter speed required to center my camera’s meter was 1/250th second.

The remaining decision was where in the scene to focus to achieve acceptably sharp focus from front to back.  Landscape photographers use the hyperfocal distance (the point nearest the camera at which the depth of field extends to infinity at the selected aperture) to determine where to focus. There are smartphone apps to calculate this point, but in actual practice placing your spot focus on a point roughly half way into the scene (which I did) provides acceptable results.  

I’d be remiss if I didn’t introduce the editing (aka post processing) phase of creating a landscape photo. It’s during this phase that the photographer takes the raw image from the camera sensor to  editing software and turns a good photo into a great photo by adjusting pixels for white balance, tonal qualities, colors, vibrance, saturation, highlights, shadows, contrast optics, cropping, size and sharpness. I teach my clients to use the Adobe Creative Cloud photography plan subscription software package; specifically, Adobe Bridge (the library), Adobe Camera Raw (raw processing), and Adobe Photoshop (final editing).

I find that every photo shoot provides a learning opportunity. In future photographs of this kind, I’d like increased sharpness – particularly in the background area of the photo. I had to use an Adobe Camera Raw layer mask with the clarity slider to improve the sharpness of the mountains in this photo. But the real lesson learned here is that focus stacking is the surest way to move from “acceptable focus” to real front to back sharpness. Focus stacking with the Nikon Z50 has to be done manually, one frame at a time, but with a tripod and patience it can be done. Perhaps I’ll address focus stacking in a future post.

Capture the Memories Found in Travel and Life                                   Email: d300dave@gmail.com

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One of my favorite digital photography venues is teaching clients how to move from the auto setting mode to the Manual mode. In Auto mode the camera’s algorithm controls all of the exposure settings based upon ambient lighting and other factors. However, in Manual mode the photographer controls the settings and is thereby able to create exposure settings consistent with the style envisioned. 

The purpose of this post is to encourage the move from Auto to Manual by providing free help with manual exposure settings. The idea for this post came from my social media searches about trying to improve my golf swing. Most were long winded infomercials that didn’t provide any helpful information – very frustrating! So I decided to write this pay-it-forward post to help photographers that may be struggling with manual exposure settings.

I encourage beginners to get out of their comfort zone, switch to Manual mode, and use these 4 steps to get you started. Remember the acronym I Am Shooting Fast (IASF) to help you remember the 4 critical settings. Below is a description of the settings; the idea is to adjust one or more of these settings as needed in conjunction with your camera’s meter so that the meter doesn’t indicate significant over-exposure or under-exposure. For most cameras, you can view the meter as you look through the viewfinder of at the LCD screen. 

• I (ISO). Most modern DSLR and mirrorless cameras have an ISO button on the camera to control the ISO setting which typically ranges from 100 to 6400 or higher. The higher the ISO number, the more sensitive your camera sensor is to light. But there is a tradeoff – at higher ISO settings there is greater likelihood that the resulting photo will contain “noise” or grainy artifacts in the image. So keep the ISO as low as possible. Outdoors start with 100. Indoors start with 400-620. On entry level or bridge cameras you may have to go to the camera menu to set the ISO; otherwise, on many cameras the ISO is set by pushing the ISO while turning the wheel on the back of the camera (below the shutter button) until you see the desired ISO number in the viewfinder or LCD screen.

• A (Aperture or f/stop). Aperture controls the size of the hole within the lens where light enters the lens and hits the camera’s sensor. For low numbers like 2.8 or 3.5, the hole is at its largest setting and therefore allows the most light to be recorded on the sensor. For higher numbers like f/18-f/22, the hole is at its smallest setting and therefore allows the least amount of light to be recorded on the sensor. Again, there are tradeoffs involved. Lower aperture numbers will diminish the depth of field, or sharpness/detail from the very front of the photo to the very back. Most lenses also have a “sweet spot” or aperture setting at which the lens is at its sharpest (typically at the f/8-f/11 range). Start with f/3.5-f/5.6 indoors and f/8-f/11 outdoors.

• S (Shutter speed). Shutter speed controls the length of time for the shutter within the camera to open and close, thus affecting the amount of light hitting the camera’s sensor. For low numbers like 1/10 – 1/40, the speed is at a slow setting and therefore allows the most light to be recorded on the sensor. For higher numbers like 1/500-1/1000, the speed is at its fastest setting and therefore allows least amount of light to be recorded on the sensor. Again, there are tradeoffs involved. Very slow shutter speeds (below 1/60) can permit camera shake/blurry photos (especially for moving objects) unless a tripod is used. Start with a shutter speed equal to or greater than the focal length of the lens. For example if using a zoom lens at 85mm focal length, start with 1/100 shutter speed.

• F (Focus). The 3 settings above are commonly referred to as the exposure triangle. Proper focus has nothing to do with exposure, but it’s so important that I’ve added it as an essential setting for creating a good photograph. Even the best exposure settings will not create a good picture unless there is proper focus. Many cameras and lenses provide options for manual focus (MF) or autofocus (AF). Autofocus generally works well, so if not already selected choose autofocus, and then partially depress the shutter button until you see an indication in the viewfinder or LCD (typically a green box) indicating proper focus.

This covers the basics of exposure setting in manual mode; I hope that you find it helpful. If you live in the Albuquerque area and would like to learn more about my one-on-one photography tutoring, please click here for additional information https://www.davidhoodphotography.com/phototut/ . Please feel free to share and/or provide feedback. 

Email: d300dave@gmail.com                                                                             Phone/Text: (210) 422-0572

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Barbara and I spent a lovely afternoon at Rio Grande Nature Center State Park last Wednesday https://www.emnrd.nm.gov/spd/find-a-park/rio-grande-nature-center-state-park/ looking for fall colors. We were a tad early, as the cottonwoods were just starting to turn, but hopefully we’ll get back again in a few days and see more color. Shot with a Nikon Z50 mirrorless camera using 16-50mm and 50-250mm lenses.

Capture the Memories Found in Travel and Life                          Email: d300dave@gmail.com

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