Exposure and Your Photography Written by Elijah Fisher Photos by Elijah Fisher
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n this article we are going to go over the exposure triangle. I want to preface this by saying that the exposure triangle is a concept that is meant to help people understand that there are three aspects to a properly exposed image and to get an idea of what those aspects do for the photograph. For instance, ISO, which measures the sensitivity of the image sensor, is not free extra exposure; there is a down fall which is digital noise. I will explain more about this later. There are three-dimensional ways that you can use the three different parts of photography and have a system where you can plot points and show the brightness of a given image using the aperture, ISO, and shutter. This can get complicated and although it is outside the scope of this article, you might want to learn more after this introduction. For this article, though, we will discuss it on beginner terms from a triangular perspective.
First, let’s go with the aperture. The aperture is like the iris of a human eye. It constricts and expands to let in more or less light. The part of the camera that contains the aperture is located in the lens. Whenever you switch lenses on a system that allows you to switch lenses, you will use different apertures. Some lenses have an aperture of f4, some have f2.8. Lenses that do not zoom, prime lenses, can be bought with apertures all the way down to f1.4, or even f1.2. Some zoom lenses that are bought with the camera have a variable aperture. The aperture changes size as you zoom in. This a common option; more expensive lenses do not change like this. A common aperture for a kit lens is f3.5 to f5.6.
There are many different examples of the exposure triangle. I choose some simplier images to help you understand what each of the sides of the triangle does. If you want to find triangles that have more or less detail and information on them just look it up online; you will find many Interestingly, the smaller the number the more great examples. light the lens lets into the camera; f2.8 is bright-
