ISO, Aperture & Shutter Speed | A Cheat Sheet For Beginners

One of the first things you must learn as a new photographer is the relationship between ISO, aperture and shutter speed. Known as the “exposure triangle,” this is the basis of the photography world, as addition and subtraction are in the math realm.

Trying to wrap my mind around the relationship between these three concepts when I was just starting out was rough. I had pages and pages of notes taken from Bryan Petersen’s Understanding Exposure. I was drowning in diagrams and photos that I took at different ISO/shutter speed/aperture combinations. One day, the light bulb finally clicked and I was on my way.

This handy chart below would have saved me much time and tears if it were available eight years ago. Daniel Peter of Fotoblog Hamburg has created this free downloadable cheat sheet card for beginner photographers in easy to understand diagrams. The card is meant to show you a basic overview of aperture, ISO and shutter speed, but doesn’t go into much detail of what it all means. And it isn’t meant to. It is formatted for printing on a business card sized piece of paper to easily fit in your pocket when out practicing these concepts.

You can download the card on the Fotoblog Hamburg site here.

If you would rather learn via video or want to learn more, make sure you check out the SLR Lounge Photography 101 Workshop DVD, where we show you how to create awesome images with basic gear, teach you how to move from the auto modes to manual mode and more on that tricky exposure triangle. Below is a sample of what you’ll learn from Photography 101.

Watch UNDERSTANDING EXPOSURE WITH THE EXPOSURE TRIANGLE

[Via Demilked]