Light Meter Explained

The single most useful feature of any camera has to be its built-in Light Meter.

Without a light meter, achieving accurate exposures in Manual Mode is almost impossible for anyone unfamiliar with photographic techniques. A lot of amateur photographers prefer to use one of the semi automatic modes, especially Aperture Priority, as they feel it makes life easier for them, but this hands over part of the decision making process to the camera. When it comes to control over lighting, the Light Meter is the key feature that will help you adjust exposure to interpret your vision so understanding it is one of the most important steps you can take to improve your overall creative control.

Please leave a comment below to share your opinions and suggest any other topics you’d like me to do an explainer video on.

Explanation of Light Meter

“Stops” Explained

People often talk about “Stops” in photography but it’s not always clear what they’re referring to. Most people are familiar with the concept of ‘f stops’, but that only refers to apertures. A “Stop” actually describes more than just the size of the opening of an iris in a lens… So what exactly is a “Stop?” I hope this short video explanation helps answer that question. Please leave a comment if you’d like me to record a short explainer video on any other photographic topic.

Explanation of Stops in Photography

Aperture values explained

Aperture values can seem confusing to a lot of people, especially when they’re new to photography. It seems to be one of those things that you just need to accept, and then memorise - the lower the value, the larger the hole. But that doesn’t really explain what’s going on. Wide apertures are described by low numeric values, whereas small apertures are described by higher numeric values. That doesn’t seem logical and often causes people who are learning photography to refer to apertures using terms like “high” or “low”, which also doesn’t make sense!

In order to try and demystify this mathematical oddity, I made a little video to explain what’s going on, I hope it helps. Please leave a comment if you’d like me to do more short explainer videos and suggest topics.

Explanation of aperture values