Aperture Control

Aperture refers to how much of a photograph is in focus. If you want everything to be in focus you need to change the aperture to its lowest value, this is usually around F22. However if you want a much thinner depth of field (only part of the image is in focus) then you need to increase the aperture, this is usually around F3.5. The larger the aperture the smaller the shutter, and therefore less light is let into the photograph. This means that you require a long shutter speed. However the slightest camera shake will cause the image to go very out of focus when on a long shutter speed. Here are some photographs of Jack Jr that I took when experimenting with aperture:

This image was taken with a low aperture and that is why everything is in focus even things that are far away.

This image on the other hand was taken with a much higher aperture and this is why only the cigarettes are in focus. 

 Here is another image I took with a high aperture.

This image shows what can happen when you do not use a tripod on high aperture. As you can see the long shutter speed has caused the image to be out of focus. However in this case I quite like the effect this has had on the photograph because it suggests the idea of motion and gives Abbi a ghostly presence.

When you do use a tripod it can have a very positive effect on high aperture photographs. For example in this image I have managed to capture a moving van whilst everything else is still.

This is an image I took in my own time of my dog. As you can see this image has a high aperture and that is why the background is out of focus.

This is another image I took using a high aperture setting.