Starting out.....

[furious5]

Hi guys

My first post on this forum.

Basically I have just got my first camera (Pentax K1000) and was wondering if people can offer advice about getting started, maybe good books, references etc.

I'm totally new to the technical side of photography, since this is my first camera which isn't point and shoot.

My main interests are landscapes and street photography.

 

[KBOC]

it's not all that hard.

A Pentax K-1000 is about the best camera on earth for the beginner. It can take you all the way up.

Your lense makes your image, however. Lense is comprised of two moving parts, focus and apeture.

Apeture and the Camera's Shutter Speed settings are the two things that you'll be re-setting the most for your images.

If you open your apeture all the way, you'll let in plenty of light and you can set your shutter speed fast, which allows you to freeze action in place with less blurr.

The drawback to opening your appeture all the way is that you're focus becomes limited. You get what you call a shallow depth of field. (the field in which everything is in focus becomes less deep. For instance, if you're photographing someone's nose on their face, their ear might be out of focus due to a shallow depth of field.

Some of us happen to enjoy using depth of field to our advantage to make a subject jump off the page.

If you close your appeture all the way, you get a very long depth of field, but you'll need to slow down your shutter speed. This is good for sweeping landscape shots, or photo-essay shots where you want the subject and environment to be crystal clear...

In film: ISO: the lower the number, the higher resolution. ISO 100 has more resolution than does ISO 400. ISO 400 is good for low light and fast action.

 

[oriecat]

I got a book that I am totally loving. It's called "Basic Techniques of Photography: An Ansel Adams Guide" by John P Schaefer. Ansel Adams also wrote a series of books, such as "The Camera", "The Negative", "The Print" and a couple more, and they are supposed to be very good.

 

[ksmattfish]

The K-1000 is one of my favorite cameras.

Two of the books that helped me the most with the technical side of photography are "Black and White Photography", and "Beyond basic Photography". Both books are by Henry Horenstein.

KSmattfish