Types of cameras – P&S, DSLR, mirror-less
Point-and-shoot (P&S) cameras are basic cameras, offering extremely simple operations and very basic controls. They're perfectly fine if all you want to do is capture moments without the finesse, however there are plenty of examples of professionals using them and getting stunning results. Point-and-shoot cameras however don't let you change the lens, as an interchangeable-lens DSLR would. Different lenses perform specific tasks better, so being able to change lenses is kind of a big deal as far as enthusiast and professional photography is concerned.
DSLRs have other advantages too. They use larger sensors so they click better quality photos. They capture detailed photos even in low light, are built better and are pretty affordable these days. However, they tend to be bulky because of the large mirror mechanism at the centre of the camera. Cameras that don't use a mirror are called mirror-less cameras and are compact and easy to carry. Some of these models are also called Micro 4/3rd cameras and are a good mix of the performance of DSLRs and the ease of use and size of point and shoot cameras. We'll further focus on DSLRs in this article
Major components on a DSLR body
A DSLR is made up of two primary components - the ‘body’ which houses all the controls and the ‘lens’. The lens is usually removable and can be replaced with any other compatible one. At the back of the camera body, you can find an optical viewfinder through which one can focus and frame the photograph to capture. To click the photograph, one has to simply press the shutter-release button.
Most modern-day DSLRs have an LCD display that can be used to focus as well as to view clicked photographs. If you're trying to click photographs in low-light and find that the built-in flash on the DSLR isn't powerful enough, you can use the hot shoe mount at the top of the camera to attach an external flash unit. This mount may differ from one brand of cameras to another.
Camera sensors and their role
Sensors are the heart of any camera and capture light, detail and colours. The size of the sensor determines the quality of the photographs and videos. As explained earlier, DSLRs have larger sensors than both point-and-shoot cameras and mobile phones. The popularly used term megapixel can be misleading as it is assumed to be an indicator of quality, but any camera over 10MP offers enough resolution to print large photographs.
DSLR cameras use two types of sensors - CCD and CMOS. They're quite similar and offer very little advantage over one another in terms of quality owing to all the development over the years. The sizes of sensors are listed as values in ascending order - eg. 1/2.3", 4/3, APS-C, full-frame and medium format. The most popular sensor size format for mainstream DSLRs is APS-C, whereas 4/3 is used in mirror-less cameras and 1/2.3" is used in point-and-shoot cameras.
All you need to know about lenses
Lenses project the image of the surroundings onto the sensor of the camera. There are different types of lenses, each offering a different functionality. The telephoto lens for example, lets you zoom in to distant objects and is used for wild-life or outdoor photography. The wide-angle lens on the other hand captures a wide area and is great for indoor photography or to capture a narrow street.
The zoom and capability of a camera is described by the focal length of its lens. A telephoto lens has a higher focal length (300 mm) as compared to a wide-angle lens (18mm). A standard lens that comes with a DSLR camera may have an 18-55mm focal length offering roughly 3 times the magnification.
Lenses also come with a few features of their own. Most camera lenses have an auto-focus feature that automatically focuses on the subject. This feature can be turned off if needed using a small slider control on the lens itself. Image stabilization is another feature present on some lenses and it helps reduce blur caused by any camera motion.
Every brand of camera uses a proprietary lens mount that lets you attach a lens to the camera body. A Nikon lens for example, would not fit on a Canon camera or vice-versa. There are also third-party brands which manufacture lenses for different camera brands. Two such popular lens manufacturers are Tamron and Sigma.
Core features of the DSLR - Aperture, Shutter speed, ISO and Manual
Clicking a good photo is one half composition and one half exposure. The composition is how you place the subject of focus in the photo, while ensuring its proportions are maintained making the photograph look good. The exposure determines how bright or dark a photograph looks. One of the controls that you're likely to use to adjust the exposure is shutter speed. Shutter speed is the duration for which the shutter on a camera stays open and is denoted in seconds.
Most DSLRs have shutter speeds that are as fast as 1/4000th of a second and can even go up to 1/8000th of a second. Faster the shutter speed, sharper the resulting photograph as almost no motion is captured. The downside however is that very little light is captured, hence the photographer needs to strike a good balance between sharpness and exposure. The Shutter-priority mode on a DSLR lets you manually set the shutter speed, while the other feature settings are auto adjusted by the camera. This mode like others can be set using the dial on the top of the camera.
The aperture is the size of the opening on the lens. This is marked as Fnumber and is measured as the inverse of the size of the opening. Larger the Fnumber, the smaller the opening and vice versa. Adjusting this value, increases or decreases the amount of light that enters the camera and this is especially useful when you're clicking photos in low light areas and need to increase the exposure.
The increased aperture also adds a smooth-blurring effect between the object in focus and the background. This effect called ‘depth of field’ is what makes photographs look appealing and professional. Similar to the Shutter Priority mode, DSLRs also come with an Aperture Priority mode that lets the user set the aperture size, while the other settings are automated by the camera.
The third feature of DSLRs that you’ll need to use is called ISO and is directly related to the sensor. Higher the ISO number, more sensitive the sensor and it lets you capture images in low light without having to use a flash. The downside of using a higher ISO is that the quality of the image deteriorates. Photographs clicked with high ISO tend to have fine dust-like specks, which is commonly called as sensor noise or grain. Using a low ISO number while would improve the quality of the picture, needs a lot of light in the composition.
DSLRs also come with a manual mode where both, the aperture and shutter speed need to be set by the user herself. This mode is recommended when you’ve progressed in photography as you need to pay attention to the exposure meter which displays a value that can range from -2 to +2, with -2 denoting an under-exposed image and +2 an over-exposed image.
If you're trying to click a photograph of a moving object or of changing conditions, the Burst mode is useful. It clicks a sequence of photos for as long as you hold down the shutter-release button. Most DSLRs can capture between 3 to 6 photos every second.
Saving photos and videos
Almost all cameras today capture and compress photos into JPEG images, however not without some loss in quality. One of the advantages of DSLR cameras is that images are also captured as RAW files. There's no compression done here so the original quality is maintained, however the file size is a lot larger than JPEG files and may not always be ideal. They're usually preferred by professional photographers and users can choose whether to capture images only as RAW or as both, JPG and RAW.
As far as video shooting goes, most cameras record videos as MOV or MP4 files. This can differ from one brand to another. DSLRs today can capture photographs in full 720p, full HD (1080p) or in 4K (3840x2160) resolutions.
All of this data, your photos and videos are stored on a memory card. The most commonly used memory card format is SD. You'll also hear of SDHC and SDHX, which are nothing but higher capacity variants. CompactFlash is another memory card format but isn’t found commonly in use.
There are several ways to transfer photos from the DSLR to a computer or to display it on a TV or monitor. The USB port on a DSLR lets you connect it to a computer or laptop to transfer photos. Some advanced models even let you use the USB port to click photos remotely from a laptop. If you're looking to only display photos and videos from your camera to a TV or monitor, you can use the Mini-HDMI port on the camera to connect to the HDMI port on the TV or monitor. This is particularly useful to playback captured photos and videos.
That should cover everything that you’ll possibly need to know when you’re beginning to use a DSLR. If you have any more questions and doubts, do post them in the comments section below.
