Comments on: What is an F-Stop? (And Why Stops Matter in Photography)

By: Michael Meadows

Michael Meadows — Thu, 01 Oct 2020 21:17:38 +0000

Correction
You wrote…
“You’re shooting at f/2.8, at 1/100 of a second, with an ISO of 200 but you want a very shallow depth of field. You know that widening your aperture opening to f/2.0 will produce a shallower depth of field.

Perfect! But it will also ***triple*** the amount of light that’s entering your camera lens. You have jumped up two f-stops with your aperture and made the exposure brighter.

You need to counter this with a change in shutter speed or ISO. To do this, you can halve the ISO to 100 or double the shutter speed from 1/100 to 1/200 of a second.”
**********
Increasing the aperture ONE full stop, from ƒ/2.8 to ƒ/2, will DOUBLE the amount of light entering.

Thank you for your attention.

By: Michael Meadows

Michael Meadows — Thu, 01 Oct 2020 20:02:20 +0000

In reply to Franco Sisto.

When you understand that the ƒ-number is a fraction and not a whole number, it’s a lot easier to realize that they are actually smaller.
“ƒ” being the focal length which is a constant divided by 2 is 1/2.
Examples; ½, ¼, ⅛…

By: John Birmingham

John Birmingham — Wed, 23 Sep 2020 13:20:20 +0000

In reply to Dermot O'Sullivan. The article said the change was two f-stops but only indicated one. Then it said the two stops would let in three times the light. Indeed if it was two f stops like the article said it should have been letting in four times the light not three. Imho

By: Corey

Corey — Tue, 25 Aug 2020 10:46:47 +0000

Hi. F stands for the mathematical term “factor’ being the diameter of the aperture divided into the focus length.

By: Dermot O'Sullivan

Dermot O'Sullivan — Sun, 03 May 2020 20:06:41 +0000

In reply to Fashion Accessories. Surely going from f2.8 to f2 DOUBLES the amount of light, and is a change of ONE stop, not three?

By: Peter

Peter — Thu, 25 Jul 2019 21:30:09 +0000

This is the first time since I started learning the photography that I had the “ah ha” moment. Thanks.

By: Franco Sisto

Franco Sisto — Fri, 12 Jul 2019 17:46:56 +0000

At the beginning of my photography journey i found confusing that a smaller number would indicate a wider aperture (and therefore less depth of field), therefore i used to think: ” Bigger number = bigger DOF, smaller numbers = smaller DOF, it helped me a lot.

By: Joel

Joel — Fri, 07 Jun 2019 02:08:52 +0000

The technical definition of aperture is: … What Are F – Stop and F … Good article but as almost every article I’ve read as a newbie to photography and aperture, …

By: Esther Elisabeth

Esther Elisabeth — Thu, 06 Jun 2019 04:36:04 +0000

In reply to Tracy Hoexter. I am studying Professional Photography. This site has been very helpful! I understand it well now. Thank you Josh :)

By: Shoot My Camera

Shoot My Camera — Wed, 22 May 2019 13:35:41 +0000

nice information. i like this, but I am confusing in what shutter speed does in the video