Delaware Art Museum Class #4: Aperture

I must confess, this is the hardest part so far!  I'm really trying to get my brain around aperture, so anyone who has something to offer, please feel free to chime in!

Apparently, an f/stop is a ratio. Technically speaking, it is the length of the lens divided by the diameter of the aperture. For example...

f= focal length_____  =  50 mm lens   =  f/5
    aperture diameter       10mm
 You might ask, like me, but what in the world is the aperture.  The aperture is the hole that the light goes through.

For starters, the numbers are entirely counter intuitive! The larger the aperture (hole that lets the light through), the small the f/stop number.  The smaller the aperture (hole that lets the light through) the larger the f/stop number.  Why must we make things more difficult than they need to be?

 


I was asking our teacher to explain to me why, if the hole is smaller, is the picture clearer?  He drew something close to this on the board but used a tree to explain...

Shutter Speed and Depth of Field

Hmmm, I'm going to mull this over a little and then post another thread to explain more of what he said!