Manual Exposure Practice

This follow-up to Using Your DSLR Camera takes students who have completed that class and understand the principles of manual exposure through hundreds of exposures in order to supply students with a foundation of their own practical experience dealing with exposures in all varieties of situations, from the frustrating to the beautiful.

“A good follow-up to Using Your DSLR Camera”
— Anne Bruun

The course requires students to either have completed Using Your DSLR Camera (or its previous iteration, A Practical Introduction to DSLR Photography) OR be confident in their ability to use histograms effectively, and set their exposures in manual to expose for blacks and whites effectively.

Students can expect to be “on their feet” the entire course, through three different streams of experience that are intertwined throughout the 3-day course.

1. Students will take exposures on their own cameras of situations contrived by the instructor to present a variety of common, challenging exposure situations. Students will have the opportunity to “solve” the exposure challenge themselves first, but also be guided by the instructor through to the final result when they struggle, including questions and answers to provide comprehension for the how’s and why’s of the solutions to the exposure problem.
2. Students will engage in group problem solving as the instructor sets up a tethered camera to expose for a variety of different exposure challenges, the results (including histograms) showing up on the projection screen for students to discuss and analyze together, in order to solve exposure challenges as a group.
3. Students will engage in both directed and free homework assignments that they bring to class on the third and last day of class, where they are critiqued and discussed by the instructor and peers to hone in on nailing proper exposures the first time.

“I have taken a course from [another school] on this topic, and I am far more impressed with this course!!” — Angela Fairall

The goal of this class is to further the experience-based growth in understanding of proper exposures and the material covered in Using Your DSLR Camera, including the chief importance of setting the artistic goal first and correcting the camera’s mistakes in manual mode, in all varieties of lighting situations the student might find themselves in.

This course was created especially for students who have the knowledge from Using Your DSLR Camera, but are still somewhat confused about how to achieve the right exposure as well as meet their artistic goal, or cannot do so quickly. This class helps to build that solid foundation of experience on which quick photography relies.