A free, self-paced textbook in 8 chapters. Read a chapter, then drill it with the 232 companion flashcards using spaced repetition.
Photography is the art and science of capturing light to create images. The word itself comes from the Greek "phos" (light) and "graphē" (drawing), giving us "drawing with light."...
Aperture refers to the size of the opening inside the lens through which light enters the camera. It is measured in f-stops such as f/1.4, f/2.8, f/4, f/8, and f/16, where lower nu...
Different combinations of aperture, shutter speed, and ISO can produce the same overall brightness in an image, a concept known as equivalent exposure. The unit of light change bet...
Light not only illuminates a scene but also determines its color. White balance is the camera's adjustment for the color temperature of light, measured in Kelvin (K). Lower Kelvin...
A lens's focal length determines both the field of view and the perspective of an image. Wide-angle lenses (under about 35mm on full-frame) capture expansive scenes and emphasize d...
When natural light needs shaping, photographers turn to modifiers and artificial sources. Reflectors bounce light back into shadows and come in white, silver, gold, and black versi...
Different subjects demand different settings and approaches. Portrait photography typically uses focal lengths around 85–135mm on full-frame for flattering compression, apertures f...
Post-processing is where the photographer refines and interprets the image. Popular editors include Adobe Lightroom (for organization and RAW development), Photoshop (for advanced...