Digital Camera Basics

In this full featured course students will start at the beginning, assuming no prior knowledge. This is not a typical lightweight tutorial. This is equivalent to an 8 week in person course. Camera Basics focuses on the features, terminology and function of the camera, lenses and associated accessories like tripods, cleaning kits and battery grips. We will learn to identify the brand, platform and sensor format of your camera. You’ll even learn an easy way to calculate your “crop factor” to easily compare different formats. Don’t worry, it’s all explained! We’ll identify and learn how to use all the controls available to you to achieve proper exposure and color. Did you ever get really blue images? Learn why! You’ll understand how to change and customize your camera strap, tripod plate types, accessories and flashes. That might not seem relevant but it can really make or break your photography experience. And without a good strap, I really do mean it can “break” it.

We’ll cover the exposure triangle how to easily translate it to learn proper exposure using our aperture, ISO and shutter speed. You’ll get plenty of visual examples to demonstrate what happens with each setting. We’ll cover autofocus modes, metering modes, depth of field, how and when to use a tripod, shutter modes and much more. Any brand of camera can be used to follow along with this course and if you don’t yet own a camera this will be a great way to know what you’re doing before acquiring one because I’ll cover different brands. Or, you can take my Camera Buying Guide course to research the different brands.

Feel free to skip ahead if needed. There is a handy downloadable study quiz you can print out to take with each lesson.

Each unit averages 25 minutes in length, some will be longer. This is an in depth course and not a casual tutorial. If you really want to learn how to use your camera, this is the course for you.