You'll find the photography-related stuff after I unabashedly ask you to do one more thing during your busy day.

I'm not a politician, but I'm asking for your vote! 

And I promise, regardless of who wins, I won't question the outcome, ask for a re-vote, storm the offices of the Washington City Paper, or try to overthrow their management.

So click the green, square "Best of DC 2023" graphic and vote for the Sam D'Amico Photography Classes in the Washington City Paper's Best Art Class category. 

Thank you.

Hello , 

Did you ever think about the importance of exposure? 

At some point, I began realizing the importance of exposure as an element of composition can't be overstated.  

Part of exposure's importance is the seemingly endless visual variety of compositional outcomes it provides.

And pushing aside the compositional value, exposure is what creates the photograph. 

In other words, a photograph wouldn't exist without exposure.

 I think of a photograph as a recording of light. 

And we record that light by exposing light-sensitive material to light. 

When using a camera, we use aperture and shutter speed to control the amount of exposure affecting film or a digital sensor.

Using aperture and shutter speed is what creates the seemingly endless compositional variances.  

Suppose we limit talking about and using exposure only to control under-exposure and over-exposure. 

In that case, we don't fully realize the vast visual possibilities that aperture and shutter speed can create with the depth of field and how motion is recorded visually. 

The aperture visually controls the depth of field and is part of what the aperture does. We can think of this as "apparent sharpness." 

Shutter speed visually controls how motion is recorded and is part of what shutter speed does. We can think of this as an "amount of blur." 

And I don't describe the brightness of a picture as overexposed or underexposed.

The word I use to describe the brightness of a picture is tonality.

And tonality is controlled with aperture, shutter speed, and ISO. 

The Introduction to Photography class covers this stuff. One starts today another starts this Sunday; both start at noon.

And there're more classes below.

These emails come with the intent of helping you be a better photographer. Here's an archive of them at the "Newsletter Hub." 

Ways To Learn Photography With Sam