How does the Exposure Triangle work?

Achieving a good exposure is essential for creating high quality, visually appealing photos. When taking a photo your aim should always be to achieve the best exposure possible, so your photo doesn’t appear too light or too dark.

The key to creating perfectly exposed images is to balance the aperture, shutter speed and ISO values to ensure the image doesn’t appear too dark or too bright.

The exposure triangle diagram below illustrates the relationship between these three elements. It helps you understand why your camera automatically chooses certain exposure values and what you can do to take control of exposure when you need to.

When you increase the exposure for one element (a white arrow), one or both of the other elements (the black arrows) needs to be decreased in order to maintain the same exposure.

Follow the links below for a detailed explanation of the Exposure Triangle: 

• Digital Camera Mastery: Understand the 3 Core Parameters That Affect Your Photos
• Photography Pro Website: Exposure Triangle: How Shutter Speed, Aperture & ISO Work Together