Beginner trying to understand settings on camera.

[swtcherry81]

So I gave in and I finally purchased the Nikon D90 and now I am learning how to use it. One thing I am having trouble with is trying to figure out what to set my ISO and Aperture to. I read a little today on these and how you can blur the background, but I'm not clear on what I should be setting them to in order to get a good picture or what they can actually do for a picture. I would appreciate any ideas or clarification that would help a beginner new to this photography lingo.

[candleman]

he he he.. good question!

heres a link that will set you straight.
Aperture controls the depth of field (blurry background) and the amount of light in.
iso controls the sensitivity of the camera TO the light that has come it.

read up on the exposure triangle.
http://digital-photography-school.co...-for-beginners
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all the best!

[kencaleno]

Go to www.kenrockwell.com he has just developed a pdf user guide for the D90. Ken

[dcclark]

Ken Rockwell's D90 user guide is excellent. I also recommend spending time looking at the numbers on your digital display (on the top of the camera body) and your eyepiece display (the green digits you see when looking through the viewfinder) -- try to figure out which ones represent shutter speed, aperture, and ISO. This will help you figure out how to change them, because you can see when they change!

[sk66]

My 2c...
The best way to learn/ understand what's going on is to adjust one thing at a time and take several pictures...
I.e. Take several pictures of a scene with the camera in aperture mode. At least three one wide open, one at about f/8 and one fully closed down (the scene should be pretty deep)....then compare the images and the exif. You can then do this again for shutter speed and finally for iso.
Generally, ISO is the last thing I change and aperture is the first. The goal is almost always to achieve either a desired DOF or a fast enough shutter speed to prevent blur from camera shake.

[conor5150]

Originally Posted by candleman

he he he.. good question!

heres a link that will set you straight.
Aperture controls the depth of field (blurry background) and the amount of light in.
iso controls the sensitivity of the camera TO the light that has come it.

read up on the exposure triangle.
http://digital-photography-school.co...-for-beginners
\
all the best!

You can't go wrong here swtcherry81. As a newbie here and to photography I have the same questions as you . I bought a Nikon D60 book which helped and for the last few days I have been pouring over the link provided here. It really is excellent for us beginners and I can't wait to get home and out to my local park to put the lessons to use.

Conor

[douglas]

You can't beat going out and taking pictures of one scene and varying the various settings . Then download and look at them with the EXIf so you know what you did.

[inkista]

ISO is the sensitivity of your sensor to light. The higher the setting, the more sensitive the sensor gets, but also the higher the noise. It's kind of like turning up the volume knob on a radio. Lower ISOs are good if you can use a slow shutter speed and you want to minimize the noise. Higher ISOs are good if you need a faster shutter speed (say, to freeze subject motion or minimize camera shake blur) and you're willing to live with the noise.

Aperture is how wide the lens opening is. It's given with an f-number, and the smaller the f-number, the larger the opening is. The larger the opening, the more light gets in, but the smaller your DoF (i.e., the less stuff you can hold in focus) becomes. A large aperture (say f/2.8 to f/1.4) is useful if you're in a low light situation and you want to use a faster shutter speed, or you want to throw the background out of focus to concentrate attention on your subject. A smaller aperture (say f/8 to f/16) is useful if you don't want to misfocus or you want everything to be in focus, like say for landscape photography.

Be aware that the aperture range you can use depends on the lens you're using. That's why a lens is described with both its focal length and its maximum aperture.

[Rolling Stone]

I agree with the Ken Rockwell site. I'ts what did when I got my D90. It well help a great deal for initial settings. Then you can go and explore from there. I wouldn't go by his white balance settings though. He seems to like orange people. : )
There are some who do not like Kenny, but his manual is very easy to understand and his settings are a great starting point.

[Dirt_Bike_Ryda]

answer to all lie with in

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http://www.amazon.com/Nikon-D90-Digi.../dp/0470449926