"When the Sun Falls, Darkness Rises" by Stephen Chinnadorai on Flickr

Most of us will set our cameras to Auto, simply because it’s easier to let the camera adjust all the settings for you — but a lot of the time, your camera is wrong. There are some situations where it’s just necessary to use Auto mode: When you have to capture the moment quickly, when you simply don’t have time to fiddle around with Apertures, ISO sensitivity and other settings.

But, when you do have time, you should explore your camera’s settings — especially if you use a Digital SLR camera. I personally have my camera set to “P” for most of the time, which means all I have to do is set the ISO, and then everything else is done automatically. I don’t use Auto for two reasons: It pops up the flash at times where it’s not necessary, and Auto does not support the RAW file format (which is vital for post-processing).

Changing the aperture can dramatically change the way your photo will look. A wider aperture (lower f-value) will give you a very narrow depth of field, which is great for macro shots or portraits. Wide apertures are also necessary in low light where you don’t have a flash. Narrow apertures (higher f-value) are great for landscape shots, where you want everything to be in focus.

There are no rules of photography. Play around with all the settings, over or underexpose photos, make everytthing out of focus — it’s up to you.