Of Storage and ISO!

When you start shooting pictures, a lot of things are important. Lighting, colors, shutter speed and aperture are just a few variables. In digital photography, there are several others which may not directly affect the picture as such but have a bearing on what you can and cannot do with the pictures later. One such variable is the image size. Image file size is in turn dependent upon image resolution, image format, compression level, ISO setting, and the subject. The first four are something you can change while shooting a particular subject.

Depending upon the camera model, there is a highest resolution at which the images can be shot. It is the most commonly referred to resolution when we talk of cameras. For example, if we say this camera is of resolution 3 megapixels, it means that the maximum resolution of the images shot by that camera can be 3 megapixels. But the same camera can also shoot pictures at much lower resolutions as well!! Now you might ask the question, “Why do we shoot at lower resolutions when there is a higher resolution available?” There is a simple explanation to this, agreed photos taken from digital cameras are free but here is a limit to the number you can store on your memory device at a time and that is a limiting resource. If you are on a vacation taking pictures at say 9 megapixels resolution, you don’t want your memory device to be full by the second or third day when you still have a week or so yet to go. Given below here is a table from the User manual for Sony DSC H50 camera which very intuitively defines the various resolutions it supports and the purposes for which images taken by those cameras can be used (every camera will have a different resolution and image sizes, to know that “Read thy manual”) :

So unless you are intending to print your pictures on A3 size of paper, its illogical to take photos at this high a resolution because obviously its going to occupy more space on your memory card for no good reason. But at the same time if you are planning to take a picture with say some 50 odd people in it and then crop it into smaller parts while still retaining the clarity, taking the image at 9 M does make sense.

Since a lot of other factors also play a role in determining the image size, only a rough idea to what the expected image size might be can be given. A 5M image may be around 2 MB while a VGA image will be around 0.2 MB. I guess you can do your maths for the resolutions in between and how many pictures you can store on your memory device.

Coming on to the next important factor that you are likely to change and control the image size is the ISO sensitivity. ISO basically refers to the sensitivity of the image sensor to light. Lower ISO will be preferred in bright lighting while a higher ISO is required in dimly lit areas so as to make the sensor more sensitive to light. There are cameras available in the market with the ISO sensitivity ranging from 50 to 800. Some cameras do offer an ISO sensitivity of upto 3200 as well but they are rare as of now. The higher the ISO rating, the more sensitive the image sensor is to light. It is worthwhile to know and remember from now on that the lower the ISO sensitivity (50 or 100), the less digital noise (the equivalent to “grain” when using a film camera) you will have. As the ISO rating goes up, your photos will have more digital noise. But again, there is a limitation to the lowest ISO setting you can use depending upon the lighting. Plus there are some other considerations as well, some amount of digital noise (grain) may actually be artsy than a nuisance. Before making a final decision on which ISO settings are too “grainy” for your photos, shoot a few shots with different ISO settings and compare them yourself. After you’ve answered these questions, you will know what ISO setting to use.

Now coming to the remaining two factors which determine the image size. These are absolutely camera and model specific so you need to go back to your manual and find out whether your camera supposrts these or not. If not, you can conveniently skip the remaining part of this blog post. If your camera allows you to choose between different file formats and compression levels, its nice to give them try. Three basic types of file formats are offered on compact level digital cameras: .jpg, .tif, or a proprietary “raw” format. Out of these .jpg and “raw” are compressed file formats and hence take less space on the memory device, .tif is an uncompressed format and takes more space. To make the image file smaller, compressed file formats like .jpg and “raw” use a mathematical algorithm that simplifies the image, thereby making it smaller. Simplifying an image also means that there is some decrease in image-quality. Proprietary “raw” formats are file formats that are unique to a single vendor, such as Nikon’s .nef format, or Canon’s .crw format. Unlike non-raw formats, where an image is taken and the camera processes it to get optimal results, a raw format image file is written to the digital photo storage media as it was captured on the image sensor without any additional processing. The advantage to these raw files is that you can use special software to adjust the original image parameters, such as white balance, contrast, sharpening, saturation, and so on. Besides being compressed, some of the proprietary files use 16-bit images instead of 8-bit images—meaning that they contain much more picture information, which can be useful if you edit the image with an image editor that can work with 16-bit images. The downside of using a proprietary format is that you may need special software to convert the images so that you may view them or use them in other applications. Also at times, these image files can be very large (just to give you an idea, an image shot with the best settings in .jpg format may only be around 2 MB while it may be as large as 20 MB when shot with the .crw raw format at 16 bits).

My advice as far as the format is concerned, if you are not ready to manipulate big files using special softwares and want instant decent results, .jpg is the way to go.

Now coming to the compression level, some cameras may allow you to set a particular compression level for your photos. A moderate amount of JPEG compression can dramatically reduce file size while only slightly reducing imagequality; in fact, you may not notice any image degradation at all relative to a non-compressed or .tif “raw” format. As compression level increases, file size decreases, as does image-quality to some extent. However this is best used when you are facing a crunch of storage space. As long as you are having enough storage space, its advisable to store images with the least compression.

Hope these few tips would help you to take plenty of photos, always, without having to worry about memory space.

Take home message: Calculate your memory space before hand and always keep the trade off between image size and resolution, ISO, format and compression in mind.

Happy Clicking!!!

The Guild

Of F Stops and Apertures

Photography is described as an art of capturing light. Now the amount of light captured on your photos which directly corresponds to the quality of photos depends on three fundamental parameters: how fast the shutter closes (shutter speed), how wide the shutter opens (aperture) and how sensitive the image sensor is (ISO). Having already known a bit about the shutter speeds, in this blog post we shall discuss the intricacies involved with the size of the opening.

Aperture is defined by a term called f/stops in photography parlance. The smaller the f/stop number, the larger the opening (like an f/1.6) and larger the number (like f/16) smaller if the opening. Just remember that it’s the denominator that we are looking at so the size of the opening would be converse of the magnitude of the denominator.

Now aperture has a great bearing on the depth of field of the images that you capture. The larger the opening, the more light can get in, and the more blurry the background, or lesser depth of field. Conversely the smaller the opening, lesser light enters and more sharper the background, greater the depth of field. Depth of-field is a term that describes the area from near to far that is in focus; in other words, it describes how much of the image is in focus. For more on Depth of field, read a previous post on YouCanClick.Com here.

In brief, just try to remember this table. Don’t bother if you cant because this will come to you naturally when you start taking photos.

Larger f Stop(like f/1.4, f/2, f/2.8)	Smaller f Stop (like f/4, f/5.6, f/8, f/16)
Smaller Opening Sharper Image Background Greater Depth of Field	Larger Opening Blurred Image background Shallow Depth of Field

Just to illustrate the above, have a look at the two images here. Both were taken at approximately the same time with a hand held camera with two different f stops (one large and another one small). Do you note the difference in the depth of field that change in f stop produces. While in one image the tree in the background is totally blurred, the other image has a sharp outline of the leaves on the tree.

Furthermore, because a smaller opening requires that the lens be open longer to get the same amount of light as a larger opening, an image has an increased chance of being blurred if the camera or the subject moves during exposure. In this case, a camera support like a tripod would be recommended. So, the trick is to get the proper depth-of-field and the desired degree of image sharpness with the available light.

To conclude Larger aperture numbered (f/8.0 or f/11.0) result in more depth-of-field than smaller aperture numbers (f/2.8 or f/4.0). Longer shutter speeds (1/60th or 1/30th) are more likely to be blurred than shorter shutter speeds (1/250th or 1/400th). When shooting low-light scenes, increasing the ISO setting (say, from 50 ISO to 200 ISO) allows the image sensor to capture more light more quickly, allowing the use of a faster shutter speed, or a smaller aperture setting. But this increased ISO setting increases the amount of digital noise. These are the fundamental trade-offs of all cameras, film or digital.

Take home message: To add ‘depth to photos’ reduce the aperture..

Happy Clicking!!

The Guild

Shutter(Bugs)

All you need to know about Shutters!!


I always believe medicine and photography go hand in hand. The more you know your medicine, the better you will know your photography. The shutter speed controls the controls the amount of time that your film, or digital sensor, is exposed to light, just like the pupil in your eye controls the amount of light entering your eye.



The shutter is a plastic device that opens and closes and thus regulates the amount of light entering into the camera. The shutter opens as soon as you click the ‘shutter release button’ on your cam and the shutter speed determines the duration the shutter remains open. The closing of the shutter causes a click sound, which is so characteristic of the camera. Shutter speed can vary from a fraction of a second to many seconds.

A shutter speed of ‘500’ means that the shutter will be open for 1/500th of a second. If the shutter speed is greater than a second, it is usually denoted with a ‘ or a similar symbol. Check out your camera’s manual for knowing the exact symbol. 15’ means the shutter will be open for 15 seconds. The longer the shutter is open, the more is the amount of light that enters the camera and vice versa. The shutter speed must be varied according to the situation to get the desired effect. Shutter speeds below 1/60th of a second are called slow shutter speeds and those at least above 1/500th of a second are called fast shutter speeds. Lower shutter speeds require the camera to be held still to avoid blurred images. So a tripod or the inbuilt image stabilization setup of your cam is required. Image stabilization comes in different names such as Anti-shake, Anti-blur etc

The shutter speeds is automatically adjusted in the normal point and shoot cameras. The camera decides the appropriate shutter speed according to the lighting. But there are still some hacks to increase or decrease the shutter speed on your regular point and shoot. I will explain about it a little later. In a DSLR or an advanced point and shoot camera, there are options to vary the shutter speed. In the DSLR there is a dedicated dial on the camera body to adjust the shutter speed and it is usually situated near the shutter release button, while in the advanced point and shoot cameras, shutter speed is usually displayed on the LCD screen and can be adjusted using specific buttons.

This brings us now to the various pre programmed modes on your camera which is dependent on the shutter speed. They have been set for your convenience, so that you can click your pictures with just basic knowledge. These modes are available both on the usual point and shoot cams as well as well as the highly advanced DSLRs. The different modes are:- Action mode aka sports mode is usually represented by a person running. Check up your manual to find out exactly how to activate the mode. Here the camera uses the highest shutter speeds suited for the light available. This helps in avoiding the blurred images especially when you take the picture of fast moving objects. But a word of caution is, don’t use it in low light situations because it tends to increase noise in the pictures (makes the pictures more grainy)

Landscape mode and night mode which is usually represented by a ‘mountain’ and a ‘crescent’ respectively, use slower shutter speeds so that more amount of light can be captured. In night mode, the more the amount of light captured the more clear the details will be. While in landscape mode, it helps giving a large depth of field, or something like a uniform focus throughout the picture in simple words, which will be dealt in subsequent posts. A word of advice here is to keep the camera on a stationary surface such as a tripod because the lower the shutter speed, higher is the chance of you shaking the camera and higher the chance of getting a blurred image.

Manual mode found exclusively in the DSLRs and advanced point and shoot cameras allows you to set up your own shutter speeds. It is usually denoted by the letter ‘M’. But one must be experienced enough to get the other settings right so that you can click the proper picture.

Shutter priority mode aka Tv mode is also exclusively found in the DSLRs and advanced point and shoot cameras. It is usually denoted by ‘Tv’ or ‘S’. This mode helps regulating the shutter speed while the camera adjusts the other parameters automatically accordingly.

The Program mode of the DSLRs and advanced point and shoot cameras denoted by ‘P’ usually allows adjusting both the shutter speed and the aperture modes simultaneously.

Now even if you don’t have a DSLR or advanced point and shoot camera, there is a small hack to increase your shutter speed in your normal point and shoot camera. The trick is to increase the ISO setting. This helps in increasing the shutter speed to a great extent. But alas it comes at a cost- higher ISO settings produce noisy pictures (they become grainy). Nevertheless you can still use higher ISO settings if there is sufficient light, such as bright daylight.

For capturing sharp images of fast moving objects, here are some shutter speed values to help you out:-

· Action sports like football – 1/400
· Children running - 1/350
· People jumping - 1/250
· Water Splashing - 1/350


Not all pictures need to be sharp and not all pictures need to be blurred. If you think about it, the possibilities are endless. This is an image got with high shutter speed. Here I was able to freeze the athlete half way through his jump. The image was caught with a shutter speed of 1/320th of a second.










With lower shutter speeds came the concept of light painting or light graffiti, one of the improvisations of the modern photography. I obtained this image by using a 15 second exposure. During this time I used a lighter to create the flame on top and a green LED was used and it was stroked all over a bottle filled with water to give this effect. The camera recorded all the events that took place during the 15 seconds and recorded it as a single picture.


As a final word, instead of being orthodox, experiment with different shutter speeds at different situations and you will be surprised at the results you get!



Happy clicking!


The Guild

Know thy Camera Part- II

Now once we know what all features our camera has, second most important thing is to be able to use them efficiently. You don’t want to be busy adjusting the camera settings when the moment is in front of you, do you? For this you should be precisely be able to remember at least a few important settings and how to change them. There is no other shortcut to achieve this than to practice changing those settings on your camera. After you’ve learned about each setting, practice changing them so that you can quickly get the settings you want, and learn where on your camera you can check the current settings.

Here we discuss an algorithm or a protocol that you may follow to quickly set the settings you want. Following a protocol has two advantages; firstly you know exactly what all steps you need to follow and thus you don’t lose any setting that should have been adjusted. Secondly, it’s kind of like a failsafe mechanism to prevent you from accidently adjusting a wrong setting. I shall explain more of it below.

The more features your digital camera has, the more you are likely to find yourself shooting with the wrong settings; that is, unless you know how to read the settings and you’re compulsive about checking them before you shoot. This depends on the model of the camera which you are using but usually the camera setting are displayed in the LCD or the display panel of your camera. At times the settings may be displayed as symbols or at a specific part of the screen may be displaying a particular setting. To know the same, you need to go back to your manual and read it in detail (now you see why I told you that reading the user’s manual was important).

Equally important to changing settings is to be able to restore the phone to the original settings. Since there are n number of settings, if you want to change only one and keep the rest to their default value its much more convenient to reset the camera to its default settings and then just change that one setting rather than resetting each of those multiple settings back to their original. Another advantage of knowing how to reset you camera is, God forbid if you happen to completely mess up the settings so much that all the photos are going kaput and you don’t remember how to set it right, the simplest escape route is to set everything back to factory default. This reset button is usually in the main menu of the camera. Find it where it is and remember it.

Next thing that you should set is the white balance of the photos. When you set the white balance setting to match the light source, white will be white and all other colors will be as they should be. When the white balance setting is not correct, the photos will have an unwanted color cast. Most digital cameras offer an “auto white balance” setting that generally is quite good at minimizing color casts. However, you may find that you get better pictures when you use a specific setting to match the light source in the scene you are shooting. This is especially true if you shoot in a room with fluorescent or tungsten light; in these cases, use a fluorescent or tungsten setting to match the light source. You generally change the white balance through a menu displayed on an LCD monitor that you access with a dial or button. Depending upon the model of your camera and its make, there could be several different white balance options like Auto, Daylight, Cloudy, Tungsten, Fluorescent, Fluorescent, Flash, and Custom.

After setting the appropriate white balance, set the correct ISO as per the lighting. ISO is a setting that determines how sensitive the digital camera is to light. The lower the ISO setting (for example, 50 or 100), the longer it takes for the light to be recorded and, even more importantly, there will be less digital noise. The higher the ISO setting (for example, 400 or 800), the quicker the light gets recorded and the more digital noise you will find in the resulting photos. The benefit of using a higher ISO setting is that it allows you to get a properly exposed photo in a low-light-level scene. At higher ISO however the photos will begin to get a lot or graininess (digital noise) which sometime spoils the clarity. At the same time if you wish to retain the clarity but still get good pictures in low light setting, try some other ways of increasing the light entry in your camera by setting the aperture size and shutter speed discussed later.

This brings us to the adjustment of the exposure settings. Exposure settings involve two very important parameters, shutter speed and aperture. These shall be discussed in detail in subsequent section on this blog. Some cameras also offer a couple of pre defined ‘Special Modes, to choose from. Special modes include modes optimized for doing panoramas, movies, night scenes, or other special effects. To select exposure mode, most digital cameras offer an exposure mode dial. This dial is usually mounted on the top of the camera near the shutter release button--

(On an SLR) (On a point and shoot)

Check it out if your camera has one and keep in mind what all features it offers. You never know when you might get lucky to use them.

Now comes the turn of turning the flash on or off depending upon the shooting mode. Besides just turning a flash on and off, your camera may offer many other flash-related features as well. You should also be aware that some automatic exposure modes automatically turn on the flash if extra light is needed to get a proper exposure. If you choose not to use a flash in these situations, you need to learn how to avoid using the flash by turning it off, or by changing to a more appropriate exposure mode.

If you are not in Manual exposure mode, you are quite likely to be using one of the electronic metering modes to determine the proper exposure. Depending on what you are shooting and how you want to expose the image, one metering mode may be preferred over the other. Typical metering modes are evaluative (also called matrix or program mode), center-weighted averaging, center, or spot. Just like changing the exposure setting, metering is a entire big topic in itself which will be discussed again later. For now just know where these setting are located and how to change them.

After fidgeting so much with our cameras, now we are in a position to aim at the subject and bring it in focus. All photos must not necessarily be completely in focus. Some great photographs actually are having parts that are sharply focused and some parts blurred to different degrees. Choosing a focus method and focal points is essential for getting the photos you want. Once again, for now, take a quick look at the documentation that came with your manual and learn how you can control the focus.

Lastly after having done all this just a few last things that you might like to look in your camera:

1. If you are shooting people or portraits and using a flash, switching on Red Eye reduction would be a good idea if your camera has this feature.

2. If there are some other special features and you want to use them, this is the best time to do so (like the panorama mode, timed shutter release etc etc).

Well, having done all this, the expert photographer in you is ready to experiment and have all sorts of fun with the photos. Remember, “Breaking all the rules is a rule in Photography”. Have fun and fear no one. Your pictures are your playground and you are free to do anything with them. Over expose them, blur them, change the color scheme and never stop experimenting. So what are you waiting for; get going friends.

Take home message: If you change the settings to the one you want in less than 20 seconds, you’ll never lose a good shot.

Next few set of posts will be primarily focusing on the details of a few subjects which were left untouched in this one.

Till then, Happy Clicking!!!

The Guild

Know thy Camera Part-I

The world of photography has undergone a massive change in the recent years. With the advent of digital cameras having one of those “auto” modes, anyone and everyone can become a photographer. There is no need to know anything about cameras or even photography (for that matter), just pick up a camera, aim and shoot.. That’s it!! And trust me most of the times the camera will do its job pretty well giving you a splendid shot that you always wanted. But I will not be wrong either in saying that sometimes the same “auto mode” hampers your capability to take some shots which could have been much more stunning.

In some pictures not everything needs to be sharp, some parts can be blurred for the better...

Or sometimes we would like the image to be a little brighter or may be less..

But unfortunately cameras cannot perceive that; only humans understand and appreciate those differences. At the same time, sometimes your camera might actually outsmart you by having the capability to add a special effect to make the image look like it was taken in the vintage years...

But how many of you do know how to achieve these effects; or how many of you even know that these effects can be produced using your very own camera? I was myself surprised to know that the same camera which I have been using for over so many years and presumed to know pretty well could help me do so many more things when a friend of mine introduced me to it again! Moral of the story is, not all of us know our cameras well and herein lays the key to good photography. Know thy camera well to get stunning shots.

The aim of this blog post is to do the same that my friend did to me, re introduce you to your camera. The first step to do so is to read or at least glance through the user’s manual that came with you camera once. Not reading it at all just means that you won’t be able to take advantage of many cool and useful features your camera offers. Not only does reading the manual help you to more fully enjoy your camera, but it also enables you to take better pictures. When reading the manual, keep your camera besides you and keep trying the various steps, adjustments and changes described there. This will not just avoid the monotony of the process but will also help you remember well how to change a particular setting so that you don’t keep fiddling with the camera searching for a particular setting that you want and ‘once in a lifetime’ shot is missed. Trust me, putting in some time to read the manual will be worth every second spent when you actually take pictures.

If you are still not convinced that reading a manual is that important, allow me to illustrate how much a digital camera is worth knowing. Go through the list below and see how much you know about your camera.

1. Manufacturer and Model No.

2. Maximum Resolution and other resolutions at which photos can be taken

3. Image formats supported (JPEG, TIF, RAW etc)

4. Compression level

5. ISO Settings

6. White balance

7. Other exposure modes like Sepia, B&W available?

8. Photo storage media and capacity

9. Picture review: Histogram?

10. Lens: Aperture range, Shutter speeds, F Stops

11. Focus: Auto, Manual, Macro (available), continuous shooting (FPS)

12. Flash: Built in or not, Flash modes (Auto, Forced, Off etc)

13. Battery and duration of activity before recharging is required

14. Time lapse shooting (Present or not)

15. Panorama mode (Present or not)

After you are done, just find out how much you know by checking the same from the user’s manual. Knowing these basics about your camera will not just help you boast about its features to your friends and make you sound like a pro, but also at times help you find out some surprise features in your camera that you didn’t know about at all. Now tell me, did this small exercise help you discover something that you didn’t know about the camera? Do let us know.

Take home message: To know thy camera, read thy manual.

In the next round of Know thy Camera we shall talk a bit more in detail about these settings and how to use them.

Till then, Happy Clicking!!!

The Guild

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