What Gear Do You Need?

CAMERA - For this course you will need a camera that has full manual mode. If you can’t beg, borrow or steal a camera, you can use a phone which allows you to control the settings. My recommendation would be a basic DSLR or mirror-less camera with a manual mode. With your camera, you will obviously need a battery and an SD card.

LENS - Any lens will do the trick, but a 50mm lens would be best for the purpose of learning, especially learning about aperture. There is more below about choosing lenses.

TRIPOD - This is definitely not essential, you can always make a makeshift one, but is nice for experimenting with shutter speed.

CAMERA MANUAL - This is where you are going to have to get involved and do some self guided learning. While I can teach you the universal basics of manual photography, I unfortunately can’t sit with you and show you where to find the settings on your cameras. I will be teaching using a Canon DSLR with a 50mm lens. If you have another camera or phone, you will need to get the manual out and brush up on your Youtube skills so that you can work out how to make the adjustments needed. 

Let's talk about lenses

Although I'm a firm believer in working with what you have, I have also witnessed how a great lens can transform your photography, and how different a simple shot can look depending on what lens you use.

You may have attempted looking at buying lenses but been put off by all the numbers and terms mentioned - 50mm, 100mm, 2.8, 5.6, zoom lens or fixed lens. I'm going to break some of these numbers and terms down so that you understand a little better how it all works.

FOCAL LENGTH

If you were to walk into a camera shop and look at the number on a lens, or ask the sales person about lenses, they would refer to the different lenses by their focal length - a 35mm lens, a 50mm lens, a 24-70mm lens and so on. The actual measurement refers to the distance between the lens and the sensor when the subject is in focus, but that's not as important as understanding what effect the various focal lengths have. A smaller number like 18mm refers to a really wide angle lens, so you would be able to get a whole room in a shot. Between 35mm and 50mm is similar to how the human eye sees, and then larger numbers like 100, 200, 300 and upward would be used to photograph things that are much further away. Here's an example of the same scene where I stood in exactly the same spot to shoot the images, but they were shot at decreasing focal lengths.

Now if you are photographing your family, you want to think about a lens with a story telling capacity, but you also don't want a lens that is too wide, because it can distort the image. Here is an example of a portrait of me, taken at various focal lengths. Note how flattering or unflattering the shots are. A wide angle lens can distort the subject if it is too close. Also take note of what happens to the background of the image as we zoom out - a zoom lens compresses the image, so it creates the illusion that the subject is close to the background. Look how close to the tree I look in the first images, compared to how far away I seem from it in the last images that were shot with a wide angle lens.

Deciding what focal length is best for you is a tough decision and largely depends on what you like to photograph - obviously a wildlife photographer and a portrait photographer will need different focal lengths.

FIXED LENS OR ZOOM LENS

Some lenses are fixed lenses, so you can't zoom in or out. That's why they just have one number, like a 50mm lens. Zoom lenses have two numbers, the minimum and maximum focal length. My favourite lens is a 24-70mm so the widest it can shoot is 24mm and the furthest it can zoom is 70mm. These lenses offer more flexibility, but often don't have apertures as wide as fixed lenses.

MAXIMUM APERTURE

Another number you will probably see on your lens is the maximum aperture. We'll learn all about aperture shortly, but what you need to know for now is that a smaller number like 1.8 let's in more light, and allows for a very shallow depth of field, which a lot of photographers love. Fixed, or prime, lenses often have a maximum aperture or 1.4 or 1.8. High end zoom lenses normally have a maximum aperture of 2.8 and more entry level lenses have a maximum aperture of 3.5 - 5.6 (depending on whether you are zoomed in or out). In summary, a small number indicates the capacity for more light, which is something you want, but will have to pay more for. If you are looking for a great lens, make sure that it is 2.8, if not 1.8 or 1.4.

Below is a photo shot on f5.6 compared to f1.8.

So, when choosing a lens, there are lots of aspects to consider - firstly your budget, because lenses are not cheap. Then you need to think about whether you want to be able to zoom, or not, whether a very wide aperture is a priority for you, whether you are happy to get multiple lenses, or would rather have one. The 50mm f1.8 Canon lens is a very affordable lens to start with if you want to start using prime lenses with wide apertures. A 35mm f1.8 lens is an extremely popular choice with family photographers. My personal favourite lens is a 24-70mm 2.8 lens which allows for a shallow depth of field but also to zoom in and out if I need to. For weddings and portraiture I have a 70 - 200mm, but I rarely use that for photographing my family.