It’s important to understand f-stops to take beautiful photos like this. As a beginner photographer, you may have heard terms like f-stop or f-number and wondered what they actually mean.
In this article we will dive into these in detail and talk about how to use them for your photography. Why Aperture is ImportantAs we have previously defined, aperture is basically a hole in your camera’s lens that allows light to pass through.
It’s not a particularly complicated subject, but it helps to have a good mental concept of diaphragm blades in the first place. Yes, diaphragm blades, which are also known as the diaphragm in optics. Take a look in your camera lens.
If you shine a light at the right angle, you will see something that looks like this: These leaves form a small hole, almost round in shape – your diaphragm.
They can also open and close, changing the size of the diaphragm. That is an important concept!
You often hear other photographers talk about large versus small apertures.
They will tell you to “stop” (close) or “open” (widen) the aperture blades for a particular photo. As you would expect, there are differences between photos taken with a large aperture versus photos taken with a small aperture.
Aperture size has a direct impact on the brightness of a photo, with larger apertures letting more light into the camera compared to smaller ones.
However, that is not the only thing that affects aperture. The other more important influence is depth of field – the amount of your photo that appears to be sharp from front to back.
For example, the two illustrations below have different depth of field, depending on the size of aperture: Adjusting your aperture is one of the best tools you have to capture the right images.
You can adjust it by entering your camera’s aperture priority mode or manual mode, both of which give you free reign to choose which aperture you want.
That’s why I only shoot in aperture priority or manual mode! Before you try it yourself, there are a few other things you might want to know. What is F-Stop? The f-stop, which is also known as the f-number, is the ratio of the focal length of the lens to the diameter of the entrance pupil.
In very simple language, f-stop is the number that your camera shows you when you change the size of the lens aperture. You may have seen this in your camera before.
On your camera’s LCD screen or viewfinder, the f-stop looks like this: f/2.8, f/4, f/5.6, f/8, f/11, etc.
These are just examples of different f-stops, and you may encounter much smaller numbers like f/1.2 or much bigger ones like f/64. Aperture is labeled in f-numbers.
If you ever read an article online that ignores this simple fact, you will be very confused. Pop Quiz: Which Aperture Is Greater – f/8 or f/22? You already know the answer to this question, om’ t aperture is a fraction.
So, f/8 is the larger aperture. When someone tells you to use a large aperture, they recommend an f-stop like f/1.4, f/2, or f/2.8.
When someone tells you to use a small aperture, they recommend an f-stop like f/8, f/11, or f/16. an f-stop like f/2.8 represents a much larger aperture than something like f/16. What does the “f” stand for? Many photographers ask me an interesting question: What does the “f” stand for in f -stop, or in the name of aperture (such as f / 8)? Quite simply, the “f” stands for “focal length”.
When you substitute the focal length in the fraction, you solve for the diameter of the diaphragm blades in your lens.
(Or, more precisely, the diameter that the blades appear to be when you look through the front of the lens). For example, say you have an 80-200mm f/2.8 lens that is fully zoomed out to 80mm.
If your f-stop is set to f/4, the diameter of the diaphragm blades in your lens will look exactly 20 millimeters (80 mm / 4), while at f/16 the diameter is reduced to just 5 millimeters (80 mm ) / 16). This is a cool concept.
Physically, at f/4, your aperture blades are much wider open, as shown below: What F-stop values can you actually set? Unfortunately, you can’t just set any f-stop value you want.
At some point, the diaphragm blades in your lens can’t close any smaller, or can’t open any wider. “wide-open” aperture, will be something like f/1.4, f/1.8, f/2, f/2.8, f/3.5, f/4, or f/5.6. Many photographers really care about the maximum aperture that their lenses offer.
Sometimes they will pay hundreds of extra dollars just to buy a lens with a maximum aperture of f/2.8 instead of f/4, or f/1.4 instead of f/1.8. Why is large maximum aperture in a lens so important?
Because a lens with a larger maximum aperture lets more light into the camera.
For example, a lens with a maximum aperture of f/2.8 lets in twice as much light as compared to a lens with a maximum aperture of f/4.0.
This difference can be a big problem when shooting in low light conditions. Because people care so much about maximum aperture, camera manufacturers decided to include that number in the name of the lens.
The largest aperture it offers is f/1.8. I took this photo at f/1.8 with the Nikon 20mm f/1.8 lens.
With a large aperture (and a tripod) you can practically see in the dark. If you have a 50mm f/1.4 lens, the largest aperture you can use is f/1.4.
Professional constant aperture zoom lenses such as a 24-70mm f/2.8 will have f/2.8 as their maximum aperture at any focal length.
While cheaper consumer grade lenses like 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 will have their maximum aperture change depending on focal length.
In between is a gradual shift from one to the other. Photographers generally don’t care that much about the smallest or “minimum” aperture that the lens allows, and that’s why manufacturers don’t put that information in the name of the lens.
The smallest aperture of a lens is typically something like f/16, f/22, or f/32.F-Stop and Depth of Field Along with the amount of light a lens aperture allows, it has one more huge effect on your photos – depth of field. I always find that depth of field is easiest by looking at photos, like the comparison below.
In this case, I used a relatively large aperture of f/4 for the photo on the left, and an incredibly small aperture of f/32 for the photo on the right.
Any part of your photo that intersects with the window glass will be sharp.
The thickness of the glass varies depending on your aperture.
Also, the depth of field decreases gradually rather than dropping sharply, so the window glass analogy is definitely a simplification. That’s why portrait photographers like f-stops like f/1.4, f/2, or f/2.8.
If you want a shallow focus effect, set a large aperture such as f/1.4.
I used that here to capture the eyes of this cat as sharply as possible, while bringing the background extremely out of focus.
(This also works for portraits, or any other subject.) On the other hand, you could see why landscape photographers prefer to use f-stops like f/8, f/11, or f/16.
If you want your entire photo sharp to the horizon, this is what you should use. This may not be as exciting as cat photography, but I still like it!
Each step down lets in half as much light: f/1.4 (very large opening of your diaphragm blades, lets in a lot of light) f/2.0 (lets in half as much light as f/1.4) f/2.8 (lets in half as much light than f/2.0) f/4.0 (and so on) f/5.6 f/8.0 f/11.0 f/16.0 f/22.0 f/32.0 (very small aperture, lets almost no light in) These are the main aperture “stops”, but most cameras and lenses these days allow you to set some values, such as f/1.8 or f/3.5. 2.0f/2.8f/4.0f/5.6f/8.0f/11.0f/16.0f/22.0Very large apertureLarge apertureLarge apertureMedium apertureMedium apertureSmall apertureSmall apertureSmall apertureHalf light a lot of light as much light as full light as much light as full light lightHalf or a lot light (a very “medium” aperture)Half as much lightHalf as much lightHalf as much lightHalf as much light (which makes your photos very dark)Very thin depth of field Thin depth of fieldThin depth of field moderately thin depth of fieldModerately large depth of fieldLarge depth of fieldLarge depth of field Very large depth of field Usually, the sharpest f-stop on a lens will occur somewhere in the middle of this range – f/4, f/5.6, or f/8.
However, sharpness is not as important as things like depth of field, so don’t be afraid to set other values if you need them.
There’s a reason why your lens has so many possible aperture settings.Other Effects of F-StopThe second page of our aperture article delves into every effect of aperture in your photos.
It includes things like diffraction, solar flares, lens aberrations, etc.
However, as important as all that is, it’s not something you really need to know – especially at first. Instead, just know that the two biggest reasons to adjust your aperture are to change brightness (exposure) and depth of field.
They have the most obvious impact on your images, and you can always read about the more minor effects later. Conclusion Hopefully you now have a good sense of f-stop and the ways it affects your photos.
To recap: F-stop (aka f-number) is the number you see on your camera or lens when you adjust the size of your aperture.
Because f-stops are fractions, an aperture of f/2 is much larger than an aperture of f/16.
Just like the pupil in your eye, a large aperture lets in a lot of light.
If it’s dark out, and you don’t have a tripod, you want to use a large aperture, something like f / 1.8 or f / 3.5.
Your lens has a maximum and minimum aperture that you can set.
For something like the Nikon 50mm f/1.8G lens, the maximum aperture is f/1.8, and the minimum aperture is f/16.
In addition to the amount of light that passes through the aperture, it also affects the depth of field – how much of the image appears to be in focus.
Large apertures like f/1.8 have a very thin depth of field, which is why portrait photographers like them so much.
Landscape photographers prefer to use smaller apertures, such as f/8, f/11, or f/16, to capture both the foreground and background of a scene as sharply as possible at the same time.
There are also other effects of aperture, but exposure and depth of field are generally the most important. That’s it!
If you understand the basic bullet points, you have the basics of f-stop and aperture. Of course, everything in practice is a different matter.
Even if this entire article makes sense for now, you still need to take hundreds of photos in the field, if not thousands, before these concepts become fully intuitive. Fortunately, you have the building blocks.
Aperture and f-stop aren’t complicated topics, but they can seem a little counterintuitive to photographers just starting out.
Hopefully this article has cleared up some of the confusion, and you now have a better understanding of the basics of aperture. how they are used in the field: Taken at a large aperture of f / 2.8, which creates a shallow focus effect. Taken at f/8, a relatively medium aperture value.
In this case, since there was no foreground right next to my lens, every part of this image (from front to back) is very sharp. Taken at a small aperture of f/16.
Here, my foreground was so close to the lens that I needed a large depth of field.