Studio{us} Mommy

Ok before I get started I want to clarify that I have a Nikon and only ever shot SLR with Nikons so what I show you may not look exactly the same on your camera! Ok now that we have that straight lets get started.

Flip your camera dial to M and grab your camera instruction book. You will need to know how to adjust your shutter speed and f/stop. As a refresher, your f/stop is the opening of your lens. The lower numbers mean your lens opens MORE. The higher numbers means your lens opening is smaller, letting in less light. Outdoor you shouldn’t need to go below f /5.6 and 400 in the shade or overcast days.

But in the event you need to take a reading to adjust your camera, this is what I did and since I learned, I haven’t went back to auto. Now turn on your camera and point it at what you want and click the shutter half way while you look through the viewfinder. You should see something that looks like this:

When your shutter is pressed halfway it takes a light reading and those numbers from -2 up to 2 are your meter readouts. A dot will show when you press the shutter and your objective is to get that dot under the zero to indicate correct exposure.

How do you do that? Well if your reading is showing your dot to the left of the zero, your photo is going to be under exposed. And to the right of the zero, it will be over exposed. You can increase your shutter speed OR your f/stop to make that dot move back under the zero. You need to look in your manuals. Usually its a button push and a turn of the dial. When you are making those adjustments keep your eye on the viewfinder and you can see the dot move.

When your dot is under that zero, take your shot! In most cases it should be properly exposed.

Next lesson will be how to use the Histogram! I will make sure I use normal person speak and not geeky speak so everyone understands