If you have a point and shoot camera and that is all you want to do, you may wish to just see what you can gain in your composition skills, but if you really want to improve your photography beyond this you do need to know some of the secrets of the photography trade.

Depth of field has previously been mentioned and along with depth of field goes the knowledge of apertures. You do need to know these concepts and you need to know what the f numbers are and mean. But they will just get brief mention here and we'll talk more about them in another hub.

Depth of field refers to the amount of any scene which lays before you and how much of it you wish to feature. You may want to focus on the foreground or the middle or back sections of what you see and this requires a knowledge of apertures which control the amount of light your camera lets in and where it is placed on the film or the digital memory card.

For those who use their cameras on automatic mode you too can concentrate your efforts on composition, but if you want to be more in control of the images you produce you really do need to understand these concepts well and of course to practice your skills.

Professional photographers reject a huge proportion of the photos they take keeping only those which meet their demanding eye.

If you refer back to previous hubs within this group you will see some excellent images, in addition to those included to-day which show quite clearly what the photographer is trying to achieve with his depth of field.

By controlling aperture settings you restrict the amount of light falling on the memory card which affects the emphasis on the resolution, described in pixels and you achieve similar results to those you'd achieve with film, depending of course on the capacities of your particular camera.

As i have advised before you need to get to know your camera well and become familiar with its manual and then keep on practising until you know your camera like the back of your hand.

You can start changing f numbers and even if you do not understand them very well, by taking a range of shots, preferably many, you will become familiar with what they produce in your printed or computer stored image.

The term resolution refers to pixel numbers and the greater the resolution the clearer and sharper your image will be.

It's a good idea to experiment with your images taken at various times of the day and you'll find your results can change dramatically from dawn to dusk and in the bright mid-day sun.

One thing you will need to realize is that when it comes to photography light is everything and unless you are using an artificial light source you need to obtain sufficient light from the sun, be it a bright or dull day.

The rocky mountain image appears to have drawn its light source from the sun and the expert photographer has used it to good effect as you will see if you examine the photo carefully, the sun falling inside the foreground image and reflected from the rocky surface of the exterior as well.

But to-day's hub is an introduction to depthe of field and apertures to familiarize you just a little with those concepts.

If you use the following link you'll find you can learn a lot more from your photography.

http://www.photographytips.com.au/trick-pics-and-links-for-photographers/