Photography 101 course on DPS

Photo: Rainer Ebert used under CC license

I recently applied for and was awarded a position as a staff writer at the world’s biggest and most popular photography blog the Digital Photography School (DPS). This part time position involves me writing one post a week to appear on the blog, which has a readership of over 40,000. I have previously had a guest post on Rapid Composition posted there, which was done as part of the interview process. So far my contributions have been well received.

Darren, the owner of DPS, asked his readers what kind of topics they’d like to see the new staff editors cover in their posts. A recurring theme I noticed was a desire to learn the basics and understand how cameras work, so that photographers can feel more in control and have more creative freedom. Having a strong interest in science and optics, I thought this is a topic I could do something about. Thus: Photography 101.

In this weekly series, I’ll cover all the basics of camera design and use. I talk about the ‘exposure triangle’: shutter speed, aperture and ISO. I talk about focus, depth of field and sharpness, as well as how lenses work, what focal lengths mean and how they put light on the sensor. I also look at the camera itself, how it works, what all the options mean and how they affect your photos.

Things kicked off late last week with an enthusiastically welcomed introduction, and the course began Monday, with the first lesson on Light and the Pinhole Camera.

I will be posting notification of each week’s lesson to my blog to remind you all to go and check it out. There’ll be lots of cool stuff to learn, and homeworks assignments to complete. I can promise you’ll learn something about photography.

I encourage you to check out DPS and perhaps subscribe to their feed as well for regular updates of great photography instructional content.