Beginner in need of some advice!

[otherprof]

Hello i am a beginner in photography, i have a canon rebel t5 and i'm not sure which settings are best for portraiture? i have been using the automatic setting but i would really like to step it up and play around with manual settings any suggestions?
thank you in advance you guys!

You may want to try aperture priority and shoot at the smaller numbered f stops, (more toward 2.8 than 16, e.g.) which will throw the background out of focus. This limit depth of field, so be careful with your focus - make sure the eyes are sharp. Of course, sometimes you may want the background sharp, to show the person in their environment.

 

[dennybeall]

Set your camera to stop any action and for the depth of field you need and then run the ISO up as high as you need. You'll get some noise but you'll capture the memory. Capturing the memory is more important than not having any noise in the photo.

 

[donny1963]

Awesome thank you for your help! any tip on searching for a Great quality lens?

With a crop sensor body I'd say any lens over 50mm that can open to f2.8 or wider. Canon makes a gorgeous 135L that is just magical.

Thank you so much for all your help! going to look into that right now! <3

I have another question for you, do you have any tips on photographing an indoor event that would require you to not use flash?

My advice is , use a flash indoors or outdoors, i use it everywhere i go, unless your trying to do something creative with shadows or something.
Weather i'm indoors our outdoors, i turn my flash on and leave it on, Because even if you have plenty of light and you are outdoors, especially outdoors with bight sunlight, because if you don't use a flash, chances are your going to notice unwanted shadows or dark ares that you didn't want..
For example if some one had a hat on, the hat will create shaded area on the head and other places.
Using a flash outdoors, is called a fill flash, this fills in the dark areas and shadow areas..

Photographing subjects backlit can create a nice separation and bring more depth to images.
But you should also know that if the subject is heavily backlit (say with the sun behind), the opposite side of the subject where you stand might get underexposed. While you can bring a reflector (and potentially an assistant for holding it) to help you get a more balanced exposure from the front, fill flash can do wonders
I try never to put the sun behind me because this causes your subjects to squint because the sun is in there eyes and this don't look good, rather i like the sun behind my subjects, for two reasons #1 it takes the sun out of there eyes, #2 creates a nice backlit area behind them and looks better.

I don't like the flash that are built in the camera's if it has one, i use a speedlight type flash they are way better and have a better range and you can control more things with them, such is high speed sync. When you get your flash make sure it works with your camera's TTL.


Today’s DSLRs have light sensors that measure the ambient light, and the lens on the camera affects this. However, when you are using TTL flash metering to set your exposure, you need not worry. TTL flash metering doesn’t base the exposure reading on the ambient light, but rather on what the flash output light will be (based on a few factors). There are two basic ways to meter for flash. One way is to measure the flash light burst as it’s being projected. The second method uses a pre-flash as test light burst (of known brightness) and this is used to make the exposure calculations. In the three types of flash metering modes (TTL, automatic-TTL and evaluative-TTL), TTL and A-TTL use the first method, and E-TTL uses the second method. It should be pointed out that a flash unit capable of E-TTL, supports high flash sync.
TTL stands for Through-The-Lens.
Don't go getting speedlight brand names, you can get a Yongnuo YN560-IV Speedlite which is much cheeper, this one is around $60.00 or so, which , if you get the Nikon / Cannon version of that it would cost you anywhere from $200.00 to $300.00 the Yongnuo is just as good.

Some photographers oppose the idea of using flash or light modifiers.
Sometimes because it does not suit their style, sometimes because they do not feel comfortable using flash in first place.
I'm not saying if they don't use a flash it's wrong, i'm just saying that if you don't it's going to be much more difficult to achieve a good picture with out it, then if you did use one.. In my Opinion it's better to use a flash, especially if your new to photography..
In time as you craft your own style, you will understand and know weather of not you want a flash in a specific shot or not. as i said i turn it on and leave it on, now of course they will be situations where you won't want the flash on, example, if you wanted to take a picture of your subject real close where the flash would blow out the exposure too much, this is why it's always good to be able to use off camera flash or a reflector in that situation.
Off camera flash is available with a Yongnuo YN560-IV Speedlite you can set your camera to trigger it even if it's off the camera and have some one either hold it for you or put it on a stand, and you can get more creative and attach it to an umbrella which helps spread out the light evenly and not leave hot spots of light, and it's much easier to control..

Donny